


Paper-thin Walls

by mtjester



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alcohol, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Abuse, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-03
Updated: 2015-05-30
Packaged: 2018-03-28 22:02:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 25,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3871318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mtjester/pseuds/mtjester
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You don’t know his life.  Not really.  But, shit, you want to.  You want to understand him and why he’s this way and how he can stop being this way.  You want to help him fix all his fucking problems.  You want him to fucking know when he loves someone and to know when he’s being loved, and you want to know what it feels like to be loved and what it feels like to love someone else and to know when you’re in love and what that means. You want to just...be in love with someone who loves you back instead of whatever this clusterfuck is you’re wading through now.  You don’t know what to do.  You’re standing here with your hand on his, and you don’t know what to do.  </p><p>So you drop your hand.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the prompt, "The ever famous- I-got-locked-out-of-my-apartment-and-you-decided-to-wait-outside-with-me with Dave and Tavros," which then somehow turned into this longer, more involved work.

Well, shit. And you thought today was going to be a good day.

You knock a little louder, but you know Bro isn’t inside. It’s too early for him to be home. Just your fuckin’ luck. But, hey, it could be worse, right? You could be a homeless drug addict with crippling arthritis and a bad infection in places you don’t want to think about. Hell, you can come up with a whole host of hypothetical people who have it worse than you do, and you’re not them, so there’s that. Really, you only have to wait another hour or two for Bro to get off work, and as long as he hasn’t forgotten his keys, too, you’ll both be golden. And what’s an hour? You can blog on your phone for that long, even though it’s hot as lucifer’s sweaty ballsack in the hallway and your apartment has no working central air conditioning ever. But what’s new? It’s hot in your apartment, too. The day isn’t ruined. Thanks, optimism.

You settle against the wall opposite your apartment door with as relaxed a posture as you can manage. You don’t want anyone passing by to think you’re some sort of loser idiot who forgets his keys at home and has to wait for his big brother to come rescue him. You have an image to maintain. It’s bad enough most the people in your tenement have no idea what a big deal you are online. And if anyone does know, they haven’t had the guts to approach you about it. Frankly, you can’t blame them for that. You’re hot shit, to put it lightly. 

You hear footsteps come down the hall, but you don’t look up. Can’t risk eye contact or anything else that would alert anyone to your stupidity. You scroll through your blog and pretend to be way busy. But the footsteps stop near you. And they pause. They’re still pausing. Why the fuck are they pausing this long jesus christ did they forget their fucking keys too or–

“Uh, hey.”

Well, that does it. There’s no way you can pretend to be _that_ busy staring at your phone. You lift your head just a bit and glance over. It’s your neighbor, the friendly one with the bitch girlfriend. Or maybe ex-girlfriend, since you haven’t heard her voice through the walls in a while. She was foxy, but you’ve never met a girl–-or anyone, really–-who reeked of bad news worse than she did. You never talked much to either of them, but from the muffled conversations you and everyone else on the floor heard over the course of their shitty relationship, you know this guy is close to harmless. A pushover, a dweeb, maybe psychologically fucked up but probably not in a way that’d be any risk to you. But he somehow always has a smile on his face, even though you know he’s had it rough. How can a guy go out and smile at people who hear his girlfriend shred him to pieces on a regular basis? You wonder what it feels like to leave your apartment every day knowing that everyone in your building is way too aware of all the ways your life sucks. Well…maybe you know a little bit about what that feels like.

After a beat of silence, you decide you might as well be nice to the guy.

“Yo,” you say, and you give him a small nod. You watch his eyes dart to your door and back to you. You know there’s no use playing dumb. You gesture to your apartment and say, “Got locked out. It’s cool, my bro’ll be back soon. Probably.”

He shifts on his feet, and his face does this thing, in the eyebrows and at the corners of his mouth, like he’s grappling with a couple of different thoughts at once. His eyes are soft, sympathetic, and way too expressive. Living with a guy who keeps his eyes covered at all time–-hell, _being_ a guy who keeps his eyes covered at all times–-somehow his eyes being like that makes you uncomfortable. And intrigued. Mostly uncomfortable.

“Do you…want to come wait in my apartment, maybe, until he comes back?” he asks. Awkward.

“I’m good,” you say. “Thanks.”

And he gets it. Immediately. In a way that makes you feel like an asshole. He pulls his keys from his pocket and slips inside, and you’re left waiting in the hallway by yourself again, feeling like you kicked a puppy. It was nice of him to offer. You probably could’ve handled it with more tact. Maybe? Actually, you don’t know if you could’ve. You might’ve been at your best there. Nice job, Dave Strider, this is why all your friends are on the internet.

You jump when his door clicks open again. He peeks out at you, and when he realizes that, yes, you do in fact see him staring at you, he opens the door and comes out. He’s carrying a sweating glass of ice tea. He holds it out to you from across the hall as though you can actually reach it, which you can’t, but you realize that he’s just asking if you want it. His smile is uncertain but there. Like it always is. Goddamn, and you thought you were being the optimist.

“Is that for me?” you ask, as if the answer weren’t obvious. But you figure some humor couldn’t hurt.

“Uh, yeah, if you want it,” he says, taking a step closer. “I was just thinking, because it’s hot in the hallway, since there aren’t any fans or devices that can help to circulate the air in here, that maybe something cool to drink at least would prevent you from, uh, prematurely dying from heat stroke.”

You snort back a laugh. “Not dying of heat stroke sounds like a good plan to me,” you say, and you can see him visibly relax, like he was holding onto some mad anxiety coming out here to offer you an iced tea. You guess it does seem like a 50′s housewife thing to do, and maybe he’s well aware of that. But damn if he didn’t do it anyway. You take the glass and gulp down a mouthful, sucking some ice into your mouth. Hits the spot.

“You rap,” he says suddenly, and your eyebrow flies up. “Uh, well, at least, I hear you sometimes, you and your brother. I hear the music you make sometimes.”

Well, there you have it. The paper-thin wall problem goes both ways. You play it off with a small smirk. “Yeah, we lay down some sick beats now and then. I guess that means I can ask you if we’re as good as we think we are, or if we’re just two delusional wannabes who are wasting their time.” You know you’re good, since you’ve gotten enough attention online to prove your worth and your bro works shows at night when he can get a gig, but you wanna hear the guy’s opinion. To your pleasant surprise, he grins and chills out even harder. 

“No, yeah, I think you’re both really good,” he says. “I, uh, can’t say I know who’s rapping when, since I haven’t really talked to either of you and can’t, you know, recognize voices or anything like that, but I’m definitely envious of your ability to come up with some truly choice lyrics. I think you’re really talented.”

Nice. “A fan, huh?” you say. “I never thought I’d find one this close to home. Glad I could provide some entertainment on the long nights.”

“Oh, yes, you definitely do,” he says. “The neighbor across the hall thinks you’re both nuisances, with the noise you make all the time, but I, for one, appreciate it, as I find it generally amusing and maybe sometimes inspiring, as someone who appreciates the art of rap.”

“The old lady doesn’t like us?” you ask. “Huh. I guess that’s why she glares at me every time I pass her in the hallway.”

He laughs. “Yeah, probably, I would say that’s the case.”

Hmm. The guy isn’t as skittish as you thought he’d be, or as difficult to talk to. This isn’t bad. And standing in the hallway doesn’t feel half as awkward when you’re conversing with a neighbor, so there’s that. You can be about this.

“Oh, hey, uh…” he says, and some of the uncertainty sneaks back. You take another drink from the ice tea to give him time to continue. He twists his fingers together. “You, uh…you have a blog, right?”

Well, you’ll be damned. You almost laugh. So you were right about being too hot to approach IRL. You wonder if this guy has been wanting to ask. “Sure do,” you say. “And yes, I’m happy to sign any merchandise you have on hand, or any body part you’re willing to show me.”

To your relief, he laughs. “Well, I don’t know about that,” he says, “but I do want to say that I think you’re pretty cool, and that the content of you blog, while sometimes confusing or disturbing to me, is usually high quality, and that I enjoy it.”

“Well, you should have said so sooner,” you say. “We could’ve jammed about it.” You realize in a rush that you’re inviting further interactions with this guy, which could be bad news, given that you live next to each other and can’t feasibly avoid or ignore him if he turns out to be clingy or weird. But you have been listening to him through the wall for a while, so it’s not as though he’s a total stranger. You don’t think it’ll be a problem. Hell, maybe having a real life friend would be nice.

“Oh, uh, yeah,” he says with a bright grin, and you wonder if you just made this poor sap’s day. Before you can go any further, however, a familiar form ascends the stairs and looks at you both with a familiar stoic expression, one eyebrow raised just a hair above the other.

“Yo,” you say.

“Yo,” he says, and your neighbor leaps out of the way so Bro can get to the door. He finds it locked and sends you a look over his shoulder. You shrug. “Locked out, lil’ man?” he asks as he gets out his keys.

“Nah,” you say. “Just chattin’ to…”

“Tavros,” he supplies.

“Tavros. Our neighbor. He likes our rapping.”

“Nice,” Bro says as he swings the door open. You down the rest of the ice tea and hand the glass to Tavros.

“Thanks,” you say. “And, hey, if you need a place to chill, knock.”

You hope that doesn’t get into a place that you’re not supposed to go, but he looks happy, relieved, grateful, a whole host of emotions that manage to reassure you. “Thanks,” he says, and he turns back to his own apartment as you follow Bro into yours.


	2. Chapter 2

You were sort of worried about bumping into Tavros after you met him, like for some reason it would suddenly be weird or you wouldn’t have anything to talk about. You don’t like to think of yourself as the kind of guy who gets awkward around people that easily, but something about the span of time between meeting someone and really, actually knowing them just doesn’t sit right with you. Especially when you could literally run into him at any point. You could be having a bad hair day. You could have just gotten your ass handed to you in a strife. Hell, maybe he’s having the same problems, but you wouldn’t know why he’s avoiding eye contact. You’re a pretty chill dude, but since you don’t know his life as well as all that, or him, for that matter, anything could go wrong. People are so much easier to deal with over the internet, when you can really ease into things. But you’re cool. You can handle it. Play it by ear, walk the walk, stay flexible like a willow tree in a storm. All the metaphors for not being a wuss about handling a new situation, that’s you. So you leave your apartment, casually, and return, casually, for about a week, so chill the hot stuffy hallway barely touches you. But it all amounts to nothing. You don’t run into him at all. Come to think of it, there’s probably a reason the two of you had never talked before, and you’re starting to think that reason is related to scheduling.

So Friday night rolls around, and you’re starting to shrug the whole thing off. You were over-thinking it. You talked to a guy in the hallway, and now you’re neighbors who have talked in the hallway. Great, time to move on. You grab some AJ out of the fridge and settle down to play some shitty video games. Bro’s out with a gig, so you’ll be alone all night. Maybe you’ll get online and pester some chums later. And by maybe, you mean that’s definitely going to happen, because you’ll be bored as hell within the hour.

You’re barely set up to play when you hear a knock at the door. This is a new development for you. You don’t even get packages delivered up here, and you usually go downstairs when you’re expecting take-out. Besides which, you didn’t order take-out or a package. And you’re not even being loud enough to warrant any complaints. With your brain wrapped up in question marks, you head to the door and peek through the peephole.

And if it isn’t Tavros, standing outside and wringing his poor fingers.

You fumble with the locks and open the door, leaning on the doorframe with a nonchalant, “’Sup?” He looks almost surprised to see you. You wonder if he was hoping you wouldn’t answer. But then what would be the point of knocking?

“Uh, hi, um…” And he goes on wringing his fingers. He’s not smiling today. That throws you for a loop.

“’Sup?” you repeat, but this time you stop leaning on the doorframe.

“I was wondering if, uh…” he says, and he takes a deep breath. “Okay, so, I have this predicament, one that I’ve been trying to work out for a while, involving someone who, uh, I’ve been involved with in the past, and would like to not get involved with again…”

He pauses, almost like he wants you to fill in the gaps for him. Because he knows you know. That sort of makes you feel uncomfortable, but in a way you’re definitely not used to feeling uncomfortable. “You mean that girl who used to come around?” you say, and you try to say it nice and casual.

“Yeah, her,” he says, as if he’s relieved you’re both on the same page. “Well, uh, long story short, she’s not really supposed to come around here anymore, but she does, sometimes, and I’m not really very good at…not letting her into my apartment, and getting her to leave, and, uh…anyway, we have a mutual friend, who lets me know if I should be ready for this sort of thing, and…you mentioned, the other day, that, um…”

“Sure,” you say, and you move aside to let him in. He hesitates, as if he expected it to be more difficult or something. Really, what are you supposed to say? That sucks, bro, good luck, just turn off the lights and hide in your closet? He takes a step in, and you close the door, making sure all the locks are in place. Not that you’re being paranoid or anything. But you’ve heard this bitch get heated, and you’re pretty sure you don’t want that happening in your apartment. “Want something to drink?” you ask to ease the tension.

“Oh, uh, sure.”

“We’ve got apple juice, orange soda, water…” You tick off the list as you make your way into the kitchen, which, as usual, is a fuckin’ mess. With nothing to do about it, you list the other items in the sink and fridge to cover your chagrin with humor. “…firecrackers, shitty swords, shuriken, butchered doll heads…take your pick.”

“Wow,” he says, but he seems to have picked up on the humor, at least. “I think I’ll just have apple juice, if that’s okay.”

“Good choice,” you say. You can appreciate a man with such fine tastes. You hand him a glass, which he takes and holds close to him while he glances around. You suddenly feel enormously self-conscious about your bro’s bizarre hobbies. You’ll defend him to the ends of the earth over the internet, but it’s a different story when someone you hardly know is standing in your apartment. You clear your throat. “So, what do you usually do on Friday nights?”

“Oh, uh…” This time, he’s the one who looks self-conscious. “Just, stuff that’s not normally considered cool or interesting by most people’s standards.”

Oh, the bane of a celebrity status. You are just too cool. “Like what kind of stuff?” you ask. 

“Stuff like...playing games, kind of, or like, uh...roleplaying,” he says. His ears are a tad pink. You don’t really want to embarrass him, but he’s got the kind of face that’s somehow great to see embarrassed. You’re starting to figure out how he’s attracted the people he’s attracted. But you really shouldn’t let him stand there growing self-conscious. That’s not an awesome thing to do to a guest.

“I’m not much of a roleplayer, but I do games,” you say. Which you imagine he knows, since he reads your blogs. If he’s getting embarrassed talking about games, he must mean games you don’t play. But that doesn’t mean you can’t start. You do do games.

“It’s really up to you,” he says, waving his hand slightly. “I don’t mind participating in whatever activities you enjoy, since you’re doing me a, uh, solid, so to speak.” Ha. Doing him a solid. He should always be using slang.

“Well, let’s see what I’ve got going for me,” you say, and you make an obvious motion to look over at your game set up. Like you wanted, his eyes follow yours. Tony Hawk Pro Skater is on the big screen. You glance at him. “Exciting, I know.”

He bites back a laugh. “It looks like fun.”

“Does it?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Cool. Have you ever played?” You lead the way to the living room, and he follows. 

“No, not this game, but I’ve heard of it.”

“Oh, you have to play then. This is classic.” You sit and offer him the controller. He glances down at it and back up at your face, his smile growing a little wider.

“Okay, if you say so,” he says, sitting down next to you and setting his drink down next to yours. He takes the controller, and you walk him through the basic game mechanics, but for the most part, he’s got it. He opens up like a dream. It’s been years since you and Bro sat down and played a game together, but you have no trouble staying engaged with Tavros, thanks in part to his gleeful exclamations and his positive acceptance of his near-constant fuck-ups. He plays the game for the game, not for the gold, and you can appreciate that. After an hour or two, you both opt to pop in Mario Karts for the multiplayer mode, and you’re off. You’re having a hell of a good time. Damn, you seriously don’t remember the last time you got this into a game.

When he finally beats you, he pumps his arms into the air. “Yessssss, oh hell yes, I owned you so hard!” he says, and he’s laughing. And you’re almost laughing. You would be if you weren’t such a cool kid. But a smile seems good enough for him, because he doesn’t seem to mind at all.

And then you hear the knock. You know the knock, and you know he does many times more than you do. It comes from next door. “Taaaaaaaavros?” she calls. Your apartment is instantly sound-proof silent.

You glance at him, and he looks at you, worried etched from his mouth to his eyes. You know you don’t really know the details. But you might be just a little bit scared.

She knocks again, louder. “Tavros, come on. Do we really have to do this?” she says. “You know this is ridiculous, right? Remember last time? You wanted me gone, so I went, and then a month later, who was sending me texts? You might as well apologize now and get it over with.”

A pained sort of look passes across his face. Guilty? Ashamed? Man, you don’t want to see that. You tap his shoulder to get his attention and nod your head towards the back of your apartment. You get up, and he follows, hesitantly, since he has no idea what you’re doing. You lead him to your room and swipe your wallet off your dresser before opening the window. Motioning for him to stay quiet, you step out onto the fire escape. He joins you, an awed sort of look on his face.

“You wanna go get some gyros?” you ask, holding up your wallet. He looks like you just asked him go skinny dipping with you, like you offered a new kind of freedom he’s never had before.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter and everything that follows wasn't originally planned, buuuuuut they're gonna happen anyway.

You don’t really know how you began hanging out with Tavros so much.  Well, sort of.  Over the course of several weeks, after much late-night introspection and a number of existentially-charged chats with Rose, you’ve slowly come to the conclusion that you’re a bit of an attention-seeker.  A truly shocking revelation, as Rose put it.  But you don’t really know why Tavros gravitated to you as much as he has. You’re a little lacking in the IRL friend department, which is something you try to avoid mentioning as much as possible when the subject comes up, which is thankfully almost never. And when you do mention your friends, you casually leave out that they’re scattered across America, more or less, with a Pacific Islander thrown in for good measure.  But Tavros actually does have friends. Sure, you’re beginning to gather that he has a fair amount of online friends himself, but you also know he hangs out with other people now and then.  Like, in the flesh.  If they didn’t sound so batshit crazy every time he talked about any of them, you’d maybe feel a bit envious about his ability to go hang out with someone other than an emotionally distant, unbearably cool sibling figure of authority. But the more you hear about his friends, the more you think you’re actually good on that front. Because, frankly, they sound like a bunch of characters.  Maybe that’s why he knocks on your door instead of going out.

The bottom line is, you have someone to talk to now.  Not over a chat client, sitting on your sweaty ass sticking to a chair with a fan blowing on you nonstop, waiting for your faraway conversation partner to answer from the void when you know they could be eating lunch, getting groceries, taking a shit...basically anything other than staring at a screen. Nope, now you have someone you can _interact with_ while you chatter. In physical meat space. You can _see him_ formulating replies to your aimless ramblings in real time.  You can recognize his voice and understand the nuances in his face.  And as expressive as Tavros is, you start to pick up on his face-language alarmingly quick.  It’s like a guessing game you always win, because you’re not really guessing at all. You really can just look at him and tell.  It’s worlds away from the stone-cold, aloof lack of expression you’re used to from Bro, who is, was, and probably will always be an actual guessing game for you.  You never really realized how little you know him or what he’s thinking.  Like, you know about him, you know his weird hobbies and his habits and whatever you can glean from the rhymes he puts down, all sorts of roommate stuff, but you don’t _know_ him.  And you’re starting to think it’s a little fucked up that a guy you’ve been hanging around for a couple weeks makes more sense to you than the guy you’ve known your whole life, who fuckin’ _raised_ you for christ’s sake.  But maybe that’s why you find yourself pestering Tavros more and more often as the days go by.

It takes you a bit to realize what this means for you.  You don’t have to go out alone at night to get food when Bro’s working late. You don’t have to play the same tired video games over and over again by yourself.  Hell, you can _do things_ , fun things, with someone else.  You gave it a go once already, inviting Tavros to a rap battle with you, since you know now he’s almost as much of a rap enthusiast as you are, if not more so, functioning as he does without a smooth film of irony to protect him from the harsh world.  And it was about the best fucking thing you’ve ever done, because not only did he drop a few rhymes himself, which were all pretty horrendous in the most unbelievably clueless way possible, but he also played back-up groupie for you while you roasted your opponents.  Completely unironic, straight-up hooting in the back like a tool. Even more than a tool. The whole fuckin’ toolbox, hell, maybe even the entire toolshed at some points, quick to drop completely unnecessary comments like, “Wow, you got owned!!” or “So sick!” or “Boom, roasted!” And you had to work to keep yourself from laughing, barking out coughs and snorting fits of giggles into your nose, because you know that he’d be the first to apologize if any of the other guys actually got their feelings hurt.  The whole event was like watching an overenthusiastic corgie jog up and down a yard with a bunch of lumbering but tolerant mastiffs.  The little bastard doesn’t even care when he gets plowed over.  He’s having a damn good time, and you never thought you’d use the word adorable in reference to a man at a rap battle.

So, hell, you’re gonna take him out again.  Bro’s got a gig at a popular club as a guest DJ, and you figure Tavros might enjoy that. Part of you also wants to show off how completely awesome your bro is.  It’s one thing to go to his gigs alone, because you know how awesome he is and standing around listening to him make magic is nothing new to you, but you can imagine the gold that would be Tavros’s reaction. You’re already preparing your face for his unabashed appreciation of your Bro’s unbelievable skill. Gotta keep that pride in check. You dress up just enough to fit into the club scene and add a year or two onto your apparent age, and you slide next door to give him a buzz.

“Yo,” you greet him when the door swings opens, leaning like a cool kid against the doorframe.

“Hey Dave,” he says, and you don’t miss the way his eyes sweep over your slick threads. “Are you going somewhere?”

“Hell yeah,” you say. “My bro’s got a gig. You ever heard of that club downtown, the Starlight Calliope?”

“Oh, yeah, I have!” he says, perking up.  “It’s the nice one, right?  Wow, your brother gets to DJ there?  That’s incredible!”

“You wanna come?” you ask. Before he can get cagey about costs, you add, “We’re in with the DJ, so cover’s free.  We’ll arrange it, don’t worry.  Can’t promise anything about booze, though, but if you need a shot of something to take the edge off and give you a confidence boost, I can cover that.”

You notice his brow furrow, and you expect him to circle around your offer to cover him, but instead he says, “But, didn’t you just graduate from high school, making you not yet old enough to buy alcohol?”

Like a smooth criminal, you swipe your fake ID from your pocket and hold it up for him.  “Bam,” you say.  “Once we get in, they won’t ask questions.  Don’t tell me you don’t have one?”  You figure his ex would’ve been the kind of person to slip him a fake ID whether he wanted one or not.  To your surprise, he seems confused.

“You mean, a fake ID?” he asks.

“Yeah.  You’d better have one, cuz if you don’t, we’re going to need to pull some strings.”

“No, I don’t, but, I already have a real one, actually, that will get me in just fine.  I turned 21 in the spring.”

“Wait...” you say, and it’s your turn to furrow your brow.  “You’re older than I am?”

“Uh, yeah, I am, obviously, since you just graduated from high school, and I didn’t.  Well, I mean, I did, but some years ago, not recently.”

The thought never really occurred to you that he could be older than you are.  He definitely doesn’t appear to be.  He doesn’t look _younger_ than you, per se, just not...older, either.  By several years.  Three years. That’s not weird, right?

No, it’s not weird. Just look at your Bro. He’s a grown ass man, and look at his life.  Questionable puppetry, video games, occasional night gigs...hell, it’s not like his interests or lifestyle are that much above you, despite the age difference you got going on. What’s a couple of years even mean?  The two of you hang out, no big deal.  Nah, this is fine.

But something about that line of thinking doesn’t sit right with you.  Shouldn’t Bro be more of a...what, an adult, who seems like an adult, who you can use to model adulthood?  You pocket your fake ID and stash that thought away before it gets out of hand. 

“Well, whatever,” you say. “Are you in or out?” Tavros quickly nods and moves aside to let you into his apartment.

“Should I, uh...dress up?” he asks as you step inside. 

“I don’t care what you do,” you say.  “But it’s a pretty classy place, so it wouldn’t hurt to spice it up a bit.”  He nods at you and gets a giddy little glint in his eye that you notice even though he’s trying to act cool to impress you. You let it slide and settle down on his couch to wait.  His apartment always gives you a good little lift, even if you’d never say so out loud. The saucy fairies on the wall, his fantasy paraphernalia, Peter Pan merchandise, stuffed animals, RP gear, card games...you have to admit, it’s all a little gay.  Juvenile, at least.  The kind of stuff you and Egbert might joke about in private, if Egbert knew Tavros.  Can anyone blame you for not realizing he’s older than you are?  You hate to say it, but the first time you visited, you understood his ex a little better for ragging on him.  Not that you agree with her methods by any stretch of the imagination or feel like Tavros deserved all that shit, but you just maybe saw where her disdain was coming from.  He doesn’t even keep any booze on top of his fridge. You thought that was like a requisite for early post-drinking-age adulthood, at least for the duration of a person’s twenties, until they settle down and start a family.  But whatever, it’s cute.  And since you don’t get much cute in your life, it’s refreshing to hang out at his place and ironically try to blend in with the fairy tale aesthetic.

“Is this okay?” he asks, emerging from his room.  You can tell he took cues from your outfit, because his level of commitment to scene fashion is just on par with yours, if a little more slipshod due to his smaller closet and inexperienced eye for detail.  Your fondness for plastering your selfies all over your blog helped you to develop a solid look that you know how to pull off.  He’s close, though.  Really nearly there for a guy who usually wears socks and sandals in public. You’ll have to admit, he cleans up well.  You can see why a hot babe like his ex-girlfriend would want to drag him around with her.

You could picture him wearing eyeliner. Just, like, to accent the way his eyes smile and to bring out the copper in his irises.  You’re not an eyeliner person yourself, but if he dabbled in the scene-style man make-up, you know some people would be about that. Not you.  You couldn’t care either way if he did. It’s just a thought. Just a tiny thought you’re careful to flick away before you open your mouth.

“Damn, Tavros,” you say, standing up.  “We’d better clean this place up before we leave, cuz you might just get lucky with the ladies tonight.”

“Uhh...that’s not really something I expect to happen, or particularly want to happen anyway,” he says, but his cheeks grow a little pink.  You really could press your luck just to watch him turn into a flustered dweeb. It’s way too easy with him and more than gratifying enough to be sustainable for the long term. But you figure riling him up more than once a week would put you on the edge of toeing into douche territory and you already filled your quota the other night.

“I guess we’ll leave the fairy posters up, then,” you say.  “Not that we would have to take them down in the first place. You might find someone who’s into that.”

“Uhh...” he says. The pink on his cheeks flame into a bright red.  Not as in, ‘oh, how naughty, I would like that,’ but more like, ‘yeah, I know, I’ve been there,’ and you shut your mouth like a bear trap.  You spent a good couple of months trying your damnedest _not_ to eavesdrop on his personal life, with little success, and you’re not about to have it all come out right now. Still, your traitor of a brain pops up a mental image before you can derail that train of thought. The sexy fantasy ladies on the wall are suddenly feeling a little too hot to handle.

“ _SO_ , how about we head out?” you say with a quick gesture towards the door.  Tavros hesitates for a second, his eyes picking apart your face with a weird half-smile forming on his mouth, but he breaks away with a nod.

“Sure,” he says, and he leads the way.  You don’t know what’s up with that smile, but it stays on his face as you both stutterstep down the stairs to get out of the stuffy hallway as quickly as possible.  It’s not much cooler outside, but at least it’s nighttime and there’s a decent breeze.  That’s about all you can ask for this time of year in intercity Texas.

Public transit is not your preferred form of transportation, especially at night when all the weirdos and drunks decide it’s time to pass out or jack off in the back few seats of the bus, but what choice do you have without a car?  You scoot in next to Tavros behind the driver and adopt your special public transit persona, complete with trademarked couldn’t-give-a-shit posture and the blankest of stoic expressions you can manage without turning into a robot.  Tavros, on the other hand, is still grinning next to you.  He’s trying to tone it down.  You can literally see him trying to tone it down, the way he closes his lips over his teeth but the corners keep tugging up, like his lips got a mind of their own and they’re tired of listening to the higher ups in the brain area.  Man, he’s gotta apply some discipline to his facial muscles.  His expression is straight up anarchy.

“What?” you finally ask. If his face keeps it up, he’ll spread his anarchy to your face.  Like the American Revolution inspired the French.  You can’t have that kind of chaos in your expression.

“What?” he says back, like it’s not obvious to everyone who looks in your direction that he’s fighting a veritable war against his smile.  You lift an eyebrow just a little bit, knowing he’ll see it.  He does.  “Nothing,” he says, and his smile grows.

“Nothing, my ass,” you say. “Don’t hold out on me.”

He barely even tries to play coy with you.  “It’s just, you blushed earlier, a little bit, and I never saw you do that before,” he says.

“What?  No,” you say.  Too hastily.  You inwardly cringe.  Those two words said in that exact sequence are basically exclusively reserved for guilty parties, which means your grave is already on its way to getting itself dug. And if you were better at keeping your foot in your mouth when you start chewing on it, maybe you’d be able to save yourself some embarrassment, but you’re pretty much resigned to your inability to keep words from tumbling out whenever they damn well please. Slippery bastards.

“No, but you did,” Tavros says, and the grin on his face utterly annihilates its opposition. He’s practically glittering. “I didn’t even really know that you could blush, or that that subject, the one that, uh, came up accidentally, would be the kind of thing that would do it for you, in terms of being flustered.”

If there’s a strategic way to shut this conversation down before it steers towards your unfortunate propensity to produce erotic mental imagery relating to scantily clan fairy women and the too-authentic audio tracks your brain thought fit to record of Tavros’s more intimate moments back in his sexually prosperous days, you need to think of it.  You take a peek at your options and decide you’re going to have to break your rule on scheduled Tavros rile-ups.  Sorry, man.

“No, dude, listen,” you say, keeping your face Vegas-grade poker.  “I got no problem discussing that sort of thing. If you got some details you’re hankering to make public, either to brag about or to clear up some confusion you’re still muddling through, I’m your man.  You wanna tell me about your scandalous role-playing adventures with lustful ladies who appreciate your fantasy schtick a little too sensually, then go ahead.  I know how much you like role-playing.  Those conversations don’t bother me at all in the least.”

And there he goes, turning pink around the ears.  It always starts with his ears.  He’s way too easy.  “No, that’s—I mean, don’t try to change the subject, about you blushing, which I saw happen and won’t be fooled into thinking it didn’t, by distractions made to make me embarrassed.”

“I blushed because you blushed, bro,” you say.  “It was a purely empathetic reaction.  So, hey, you’ve had some wild nights dressing up as Peter Pan with your own sultry Tinkerbell, so what?  We can chat about it if you want.”

And, shit, his blush goes from 1 to 100 in a heartbeat, and you’re again forced to realize that maybe you’re a little too close for comfort on this subject.  Goddamn, but _really_? Peter Pan?  Dude.

“That...that was her idea,” he mumbles, and that’s it.  You regret everything.  Time to pay the price for your fast fucking mouth, and apparently the price is a way too vivid mental simulation of whatever that whole disaster must have been like, complete with audio.  Is it you, or is the bus getting a hotter?  Stuffier, at least.  You need some fresh air.

“Hey, you’re a strong, independent man who can explore your sexuality however you want,” you say. At least you still sound smooth.

“Thanks...?” he says. He can’t tell if you’re serious anymore.  Good.

“You’re welcome.” Almost there, and...you touch the signal to call for a stop.  The bus slows, and you’re the first to your feet.  You throw Tavros a small smirk to bring him down lightly, since he can get a little jumbled up if you push too many buttons at once. “Ready?”

“Oh, yeah,” he says, getting to his feet.  You lead the way out into the sweet bliss of open air, and the breeze carries away some of the heat from your body.  You inhale a deep breath to get your lungs working right again.  And now you have a real excuse to change the subject.

“Follow me,” you say. “We still got a few blocks to walk.”  You set a nice pace, easy-going, enough to keep a bit of swagger in your step but still make good time.  Tavros doesn’t have much in the way of swagger, but he falls in next to you easily. After a few minutes of silence, you start to chatter at him about your Bro and the venue and how much he’s about to have his mind blown straight out of the back of his skull with awe, and you stop to take a selfie with him beneath an orange streetlight. You’re late enough when you finally reach the Starlight Calliope that the line’s died down a bit. Once you make it to the door, the bouncer glances at your IDs and you tell him you’re with the DJ. He was expecting you. No cover.

The music filters through the neon doors as they open, and your senses are assaulted by the familiar sound of your Bro’s ill beats.  You’d recognize his unreal artistry anywhere.  His style is like a brand, obvious to anyone who knows even the most basic shit about him, and you’re so in with it that you practically wear it. You don it like a well-tailored suit or how you imagine a really classy broad might slip into some silky lingerie. The club pulses with strobe lights, misted lasers, and crowds of people dancing like snakes for a snake charmer.  Bro’s a true puppet master, controlling every twitch and shiver of the throng like they’re all little puppets dangling from his vibrating strings, and you’ve reached just enough of a musical enlightenment to see it all like no one else can. But you’re not above it. Not even you can resist the magic. The magic’s got you ensnared. You’re a slave to the beat, and you don’t even care.

Tavros’s got it worse anyway. He’s completely succumbed. Someone call a doctor, the guy’s been hardcore infected by your Bro’s sick fires and needs immediate medical attention. A quarantine’s in order, but the population of the building is doomed anyway, so you’re gonna let him run wild among the infected. This condemned madhouse’s got hot babes twisting on poles, dudes sweating rivers through their muscle shirts, paper falling from the ceiling, and the floor is sticky, and the room is hot, and goddamn you already need a drink.  You shimmy between thrashing bodies shouting in tongues and sloshing booze onto the floor in a perilous expedition to the bar, and when you finally make it, you order two.  You turn to find Tavros behind you.  Huh.  You figured you’d have to go diving to rescue him.  You shove the second drink into his hands and turn away before he can argue about it.

Bro’s in his nest up at the DJ booth.  As if he knows exactly where you are, and maybe he does, hell if you know, he throws you a miniscule salute.  You return it. You sneak a glance over your shoulder at Tavros, who has stars in his eyes, the way they practically fucking glimmer in the light show blazing in bursts up and down the room. That’s all you really wanted to see tonight.  Time to go home.

But of course that’d be way too hasty.  Why the hell would you invite Tavros to a club and not spend a bit of time dancing? That wouldn’t be very neighborly of you.  So you down your drink and wait for him to finish his, which doesn’t take him any time at all after he realizes you’re waiting, and then you part the sea for him to the front of the crowd, right in view of Bro.  Maybe you’re laying it on a bit thick, but you want Tavros to really bask in the actual fucking godhood Bro can achieve when he’s got the technology at his disposal.  All these people, worshipping at the altar, and you want him to feel that.  Besides, there are a pair of gorgeous women in neon bikinis on the edge of the DJ booth swaying their hips in a way that’d make a gay man’s mouth go dry, and you think Tavros might appreciate that.  He’s been single for a while now, after all. And his last girlfriend was definitely attractive enough to set the bar high.  Ladies got some expectations to live up to.  But he really doesn’t seem that interested in the sights as far as hot babes go.  He really is infected by the beat.  And when he starts to move, you can’t really not give in, too.

He dances like a fucking goober. Not _bad_ , exactly, not like he can’t keep a beat or figure out how to coordinate his arms and his hips, but you can see him get lost in his elation and just jibe with it.  It’s like the holy ghost of club music has taken possession of his earthly flesh and filled it with the divine desire to get the fuck down and bust a move.  You’re glad he’s just self-conscious enough to keep it in check, or you think he’d be too hot to handle for nearby clubbers. It’s spectacular, really, how he goes on and on about his self-confidence and really is way too hard on himself on his rough days, but when he loves something, he fucking loves it. He’s all in and soaring, and damn if it’s not making a familiar clubbing experience something else entirely. God, he’s a fucking gem sometimes.

You, on the other hand, are not a gem.  You’re not really the kind of guy to let all your hair down on any sort of dance floor to flow sweaty and magnificent in the vibrating shockwaves bouncing with the bass from the speakers. You got your hair up in a tight little figurative bun and you intend to leave it that way.  Frankly, you don’t know if you even _can_ let loose like that.  It’s the cross you carry as an unwavering cool kid. The only way you know how to dance is fucking sleek as shit.  Your brilliance with a beat extends way beyond rap, and you got rhythm, style, class, and probably a dash of sexy if you throw modesty to the wind and get real about it.  It’s truly unfortunate that you’re so on point all the goddamn time.  Damn your stalwart devotion to your image and your eternal pledge to Strider family irony.

But for a second, when you glance over at Tavros, he’s standing still and watching you with a look of unmask admiration, and you think, shit, maybe you’re doing just fine.


	4. Chapter 4

It’s three in the morning and you’re in the shittiest diner you could find that’s still open, shooting the shit with Tavros with no real desire to head home any time soon. You’re both still a little buzzed. At least, you are. Tavros might not be. He might just be riding the all-natural brain chemical high of a good night out bumping and grinding to the best beats this side of the Alamo.  You’re doing pretty good yourself, but you can say without a shadow of a doubt you still have a bit of booze running through your blood, just enough to make you a little less anal retentive about the pathological devotion you have to your persona.  You’re relaxing with an absolutely massive pile of chili fries in front of you, half of which Tavros is picking apart while he talks.  He’s all giddy and shit.  It’s contagious.

“Your Bro is truly a magician when it comes to producing quality music, the likes of which I’ve never experienced before,” he says, gushing like a fangirl.  He’s said something along the same lines at least twice already. Damn, you might just get jealous, except that it’s absolutely true and your Bro is awesome.

“You should see his process, man,” you say.  “Not that he’d _let_ you see his process. I hardly get to see his process, and I fucking live with him.  But I get an exclusive front row seat, since he taught me literally everything I know about the art of dropping it like it’s hot.  Not many kids out there get access to the absolute fucking gift that is the quality tutelage I’ve received.  I mean, it’s almost a burden, the way I’m obviously expected to reach some new level of fast-talking rap ninja wizard with such a delirious biznasty flow that I overthrow my master and herald in a new age of verbal acrobatics.”

“Wow,” he says, munching down on a soggy fry.  “That sounds like a difficult expectation to live up to, but, um, I’m assuming you’re probably already on the way to doing that thing, so just let me know when to show up, so I can watch you herald in this new age, so to speak.”  He grins, and the corners of your lips twitch up. Little things like that make you feel warm somehow.  You don’t get it, but it’s nice.

“You gonna be my groupie?” you ask, fighting to keep your face under control.  Goddamn it, you’re having a hell of a time tonight. “Well, whatever, any good messiah needs a couple of sassy apostles to repeat a chorus of ‘oh snaps’ every time the good savior lays down the law, so you’re hired.  Better start collecting your notes into an authoritative canon and learning every meaningless minutia of the new creed.”

“Yessss, I can do that,” he says.  “If what you need is a singularly devote person, to marry your lyrical church in an act of piety, and dedicate their life to the study of your lore, as what you put down with your godlike skills to burn your opponents, I, to fit into this analogy, am the priest you’re looking for.”

“Oh my god, dude,” you say, and a smile busts out like an inmate out of federal prison.  You shove a fry into your face so you can conceal your shameless lack of decorum, but Tavros is already glowing.

“But, in all honesty, silly joking around with extended metaphors aside, I really do admire both you and your brother, for being as cool and generally incredible as you are,” he says. He leans heavily on his elbows, a wistful kind of look settling on his face.  “I envy that you’re both as good as you are at your respective hobbies, and as successful, with the approval of everyone you know.”

You collect yourself and wipe some chili cheese off your face.  “Hey, man, don’t sell yourself short,” you say.  “Besides, my Bro is entire galaxies ahead of me, so grouping us together is really giving me way too much credit.  I mean, yeah, it totally makes sense to be envious of his skill, but you might wanna reconsider putting me on that pedestal unless you want to experience some crippling disillusionment at some point in the future.”

Tavros’s face goes blank with surprise.  Not really the reaction you expected.  “You don’t really think so, that you’re not at least a little as impressive, do you?” he asks.  Shit. The energy of the conversation takes a subtle shift that you’re not sure you like.

“Truth is truth,” you say with a tiny shrug.  “You saw him tonight. I mean, I’m not saying I’m _not_ the shit, but he’s way more the shit than I am.  He’s The Shit, you know what I mean?  I’m cool with that.”

“No, but actually, I think if it were you, up there with all the fancy equipment and the light shows and the dancers, I think you would do just as well,” Tavros says. He’s got some sort of earnest shine in his eyes that’s really making you feel weird, because it’s so painfully obvious that he means what he says.  Not that he ever doesn’t mean what he says.  And you...don’t want him to?  You just think he’s wrong is all.  Like when someone tries to pass it off like you look good in a photo when you don’t. 

“Yeah, well, the thing is I wasn’t the one up there, and there’s a reason for that,” you say. “But it’s cool. I’m not harboring any ill feelings about that shit.  He’s just that good.”  You turn up the chill in your attitude a notch, since apparently you let it slip there for a second, and pick up another fry as nonchalantly as you can manage. Tavros watches you eat it with his brow furrowed.  He’s not buying it.

“Did, uh...do you really mean it, when you talk about having to live up to expectations, like becoming better than him at mutual activities you both care about?” he asks. Fuck.

You stall. It’s not that you don’t want to talk about it.  Actually, no, it _is_ that you don’t want to talk about it, but you can’t find any reason not to.  Tavros talks about his self-confidence issues all the time. For you, the whole deal makes you uncomfortable.  People just...slapping their feelings on the table and examining them honestly, like it’s no big deal and every problem is easy to peg down and sort out. Sure, Rose pokes and prods sometimes, but that’s about where it ends with you.  You’ve got insecurities, just like the next guy, but you don’t _talk_ about them. You almost feel like the opposite of Tavros in that respect.  He’s almost constantly affirming verbally how anxious and inept he is as a person, but in all actuality, he doesn’t ever seem too shy or embarrassed about who he is or what he likes, or at least not enough to stop him. You, on the other hand, don’t like to mention any of your sensitive shortcomings if you can avoid it and prefer to operate behind a wall of irony almost literally 24/7.  So how the hell are you supposed to dialogue about this? It’s not your thing. You’re not about it.

But every second that ticks by in silence lets Tavros fill in the gaps to make all your misgivings seem way more weighty than they actually are.  Probably.  You don’t know how weighty they actually are because you avoid thinking about them. Fuck, you’re not really giving yourself a hand up here.  “Look, it’s just complicated sometimes,” you finally say.  “You know, having a really awesome older sibling, let’s just say the shadow is long and I’m gonna have to go a ways before I stop standing in it.”

Tavros doesn’t answer immediately.  He seems to be actively considering what you’ve said.  You hope he doesn’t blow it up or try to initiate some sort of psychobabble feelings workshop like Rose tries to do sometimes. He nods slowly. “I think I understand a little bit about what you mean, even though in my own experiences with siblings, my brother and I have a completely different relationship dynamic, one that is generally friendly and much less competitive than what you seem to have with your brother.  Well, uh, barring the fact that he’s always been way more popular than I have, and that he’s wildly attractive, such that almost anyone he’d want to date would probably agree to go out with him, and maybe that even though our hobbies are similar, he makes them look cool, whereas I don’t, so...uh.”  He pauses to recalibrate his bearings because he clearly got a little ahead of himself there, but he’s already done enough to distract you because, shit, you didn’t even know he has a brother.  And if the guy can make Tavros’s lame hobbies look cool, he must be a tough act to follow.  But Tavros dispels everything he said with a wave of his hand. “The point is, I think you admire the traits in your brother you wish you had more of, and that maybe, in doing so, you don’t give your other good traits, the ones that are particular to you, enough credit.”

“Such as?”

“Such as, uh...for instance, your ability to take good selfies!  Even though I’m pretty sure you enjoy taking selfies as a form of engaging in secret humor with yourself.”  And that’s a hundred points to Tavros for Dave trivia.

“You caught me,” you say with a tiny little smirk.  The gesture gives Tavros an instant boost in confidence that registers clearly on his face like a receipt for your positive facial feedback.  Maybe that’s another thing you’re good at that’s particular to you.  Tavros boosting.

“I think what I mean to say with this conversation,” he says, picking up where he left off with a little more bravado, “is that your frame of reference, being your bro, prevents you from seeing how exceptional you really are in comparison to the general public. Uh, for example, if you change your frame of reference so that you’re comparing yourself to someone else, like me, you’ll see that you’re a really unique and talented person.”

“Nah, man, let’s not do that,” you say.  “I’m not about to go comparing myself to any of my friends.  That’s a recipe for disaster, with ingredients that are way too easy to find.”

“No, but hear me out,” he insists.  “Because, when I said I envy you, I want to be clear that I mean that, in reference to me, you’re an enviable person.  Like, about rapping, you’re so much better than I am that you’re practically already the sort of messiah we were previously describing.  You’re really fantastic at dropping beats and coming up with truly sick rhymes on the fly, unlike me, who, uh, stumbles over what I mean a lot, and also maybe spends too much time rapping about uncool things, or relies too much on notes and isn’t so good at free style...that’s what I was saying when I mentioned how much I envy you.”

“But that’s what I like about you,” you spit out before your brain catches up.  You bite your tongue and stop a grimace from twitching onto your face before it can reveal your fuck up.  It’s not like you said anything wrong or particularly embarrassing.  You just offered him a compliment.  That’s a perfectly normal thing that you do sometimes.  What the fuck, why do you feel so agitated about it? God DAMN.

Tavros looks confused, and probably for a good fucking reason.  “You like that I’m not very good at rap?” he asks.  Yeah, like that makes any sense.  Now you’re an accidental asshole.

“No, dude, that’s not—I mean, yeah, so sometimes you’re not the most vicious opponent a guy could ask for, but I was referring more specifically to...”  To?  To what? To...  “To the way you just go out and do things,” you finish. Yeah.  Yeah, that’s it.  That’s what you meant.  “You know?  Like how you rap about things that are—quote—‘uncool’—end quote.  Your fairy tale crap and all that.  Obviously you think all that shit is uncool because you literally just said so, but does that stop you?  No, because you’re a bigger guy than any of the snobbish naysayers with sticks up their asses who might get in your grill about it. I may be good at some shit, but you’re real about the stuff you love.  That’s worth a lot.”

His mouth is open, just a crack, just so his lips are barely parted, just enough to tell you that you said something more than you intended to mean.  The look he’s giving you is not the look you thought he’d be giving you.  Not that you expected any sort of look in particular, but if you had been, this would not be it. It’s too...deep, or something, like you got your hands into some part of his inner workings you didn’t know was there to be touched.  Should you keep talking?  Maybe if you keep talking, you can work him down.  Yeah, talking more should fix this.  But he gets his voice back before you get yours.

“Uh, when you say that, um, my open enjoyment of my hobbies, and engaging in them even though they’re uncool, makes me the ‘bigger man’...” he says, some sort of hopeful glimmer dancing up into his eyes, “what, um...what do you mean by that?”

“What do I—?” you repeat. He’s throwing you for all kinds of loops today.  You’ll start to get dizzy here if you don’t straighten shit out.  The booze ain’t doing you any favors either. “I mean, like, there are fuckers out there who put other people down for the stuff they like, especially over things they deem lame versus not lame or whatever, so there are all these self-important shitheads with their dicks out jacking it to their own supposed superiority based on their specific set of interests they may or may not have when, in reality, they’re just cowards who are too afraid of other people’s judgment to admit how much they’re into what they’re actually into. Which, obviously, makes you the bigger man, since you can own up to what you enjoy in public and actually, you know, _enjoy_ it.  Not everyone has the steel balls to risk that kind of criticism, you know?”

It strikes you as you talk how much of a huge, obvious hypocrite you are.  It’s obvious to you, at least.  You might as well tear into people who hold everything they say or do up to some cool and smartassy benchmark that doesn’t even really exist, or people who have to filter everything they like through several layers of irony so that half of their real interests become a complete fucking mystery, or people who are obsessed with living up to unreal standards of strength or skill or prestige that would feel absolutely impossible if someone they admired to the moon and back didn’t do it all first.  Is this why you like Tavros so much?  Because when you go into his apartment, it doesn’t feel like everything is trying to fit into some try-too-hard cool kid mold that you barely recognize exists?  _Did_ you recognize it exists before he snuck into your life with an awkward introduction and a glass of ice tea?  Do you...do you see something that you didn’t before, now that you know him?

“I, uh...I’m glad you said that,” he says, and you snap back to reality with enough force to induce mental whiplash.  But damn, he does seem glad.  What the fuck is going on with this conversation?

“Why?” you ask.

“Uh, well...” he says, and he shifts in his seat in a way that puts you on edge.  He does that when shit’s going down in his brain that makes him anxious.  Next, he’ll be wringing his fingers, and you’re gonna get that feeling in your gut that you hate.  “Vriska used to get bossy about that sort of stuff, like how lame I was and that kind of thing.”

Oh, the bitch girlfriend. It’s official. The conversation has crashed and burned, and you’re just trying to pull survivors out of the rubble. You sigh quietly through your nose and accept the burden with dignity.  “Fuck her, man,” you say, like the eloquent son of a dick you are.

“Oh, yeah, of course,” he says.  “But, I’m glad that there’s logic that someone can conjure, concerning the enjoyment of weak and lame activities, that allows the enjoyment of those activities to be something that makes someone not weak and lame, but rather, impressive, or at least acceptable.”

“Yeah, duh,” you say. “It’s not like Vriska’s right about everything.”

“Well...she’s at least a little right about a lot of things.”

“No, she’s not. C’mon, dude, we talked about this.”

“Yeah, I know, but I don’t think that her attitude, although it’s terrible and nasty, negates the fact that she is admittedly clever, and often right about a lot of things.”

“She’s not!” You hate it when he does this. You fucking hate it. You keep your face blank, but you’re getting a tad hot under the collar.  Why is he so bullheaded about defending her when every new story you hear from him makes her out to be the real life female equivalent of a mustache-twirling cartoon villain?  She fucking tried to toss him off a roof, for fuck’s sake. Not that you haven’t almost been pushed off a roof more times than you can count, but not by a significant other. Big brothers just do shit like that.  Girlfriends don’t. “Look, man,” you say. “It doesn’t matter how clever she is, supposedly, even though the issue of her supposed cleverness is something that’s really up in the air as far as I’m concerned.  Anyone who pushes you around and screws with your mind to force you to live up to some fucked up ideal isn’t right.”

“Oh, no, I didn’t mean she was right about _that_ ,” Tavros says. “Even though, strictly speaking, she is right that I’m objectively lame and boring.”

“You’re not lame and boring!”

“I, uh...I’m a grown man who plays a children’s card game competitively.”

You open your mouth and close it.  Well. That is true.  And you did basically think almost literally that exact same thought earlier tonight in his apartment, with all the well-meaning, elitist disdain implied.  Like, down to the adult man with lame hobbies part.  You also gave a nod of understanding to Vriska for ragging on him about it.  So there you have it. You actually do agree that Tavros is a lame adult who likes lame stuff for pansies.  But...you don’t, though.  Like, you don’t actually believe he’s all that stuff right now, not in the least bit.  One side of you might, the side of you that’s way invested in all the useless shit you got laying around your house, like your Bro’s puppets and your glitchy video games and the weapons in the fridge and the kickass notes your Bro leaves you when he’s messing around with you, but out of fucking nowhere a whole new part of your brain claws its way out front and says, ‘Yo, what the fuck, you _like_ hanging out at Tavros’s with all his stupid gay fantasy crap.’  And while it’s at it, it adds, ‘Also, you hate puppets, those games are boring, it sucks that you never have any food in the fridge, and those notes are really fucking creepy.’

You’re suddenly feeling vulnerable, like _really_ fucking vulnerable, and you don’t understand why.  Who cares if Tavros is a grown man who plays children’s card games competitively? Who cares if you like hanging out at his place and playing his idiotic card games with him, surrounded by plushies of a decidedly innocent variety and posters of fairies? So fucking what if you enjoy his company more than anyone else’s you ever met and feel more real around him than you have in your whole life?  But the honest answer is you do.  You do care.  Not, like, in a way that's his fault or anything--he’s a gem, a fucking diamond, imperfect in ways that makes you...happy, or something.  But everything he’s about, you’re not about. It doesn’t fit with who you are. And who you are...damn, you’re starting to wonder if you even know what that is anymore.  Your careful facade suddenly feels like it’s getting ready to crumble apart.

“You can do whatever you want, and none of it makes you lame or boring,” you say, coolly. Like a cool kid. Like a straight-faced, fast-talking hot shot with a big-time blog.  But you feel like a furnace and the diner is way too small.  “But hey, it’s getting late, so how about we get outta here?”

To your relief, he nods. “Yeah, I agree,” he says, and he slides out of the booth.  You follow him, pay the cashier, and walk out into the cool night, but your head keeps ringing and buzzing in some kind of angry orchestra of shit you don’t want to think about.  You can’t shake the ruckus happening in your brain space, so you try wrestling all the noise and rambling thoughts into some kind of rhythm and rhyme.  That helps.  None of the gibberish that finds its way into your sentences makes much sense to you and it all puts more pressure on the uncomfortable tightness throbbing in your chest, but it clears away some of the gross racket in your mind. You don’t even realize you’re murmuring to yourself until you’re sitting on the bus and Tavros whispers, “I like that one,” next to you.

You don’t know what to say, so you just say, “Thanks.”  But some of the pressure lifts anyway.  You want to lean on him, but you don’t.  You just let your legs fall apart a little more so your thigh brushes against his.

The bus drops you off, and as you follow him up the stairs towards your respective apartments, your heart thumping a little harder in your chest, like a bass line, some sort of corporeal callback to the booming beat you were dancing to just a couple of hours ago, the absurd idea pops into your head that you should stay in his apartment tonight.  Maybe for some kind of post-clubbing bro-to-bro sleepover.  In his bed.  Just to chill.  That’s all.  Friends do that, right? Right?  You don’t really know.  But it’s something you want to do, suddenly, so much that the idea of going back to your own apartment almost aches.  Kinda like how it used to feel when Bro left for hours and hours at a time when you were a kid, that painful feeling of loneliness and heartache.  What the fuck is wrong with you?  You’re a grown man, too, and you’re acting like a pussy.  You suck in a deep breath and run right into the back of Tavros, who’s stopped at the top of the stairs on your floor.

“What the hell?” you ask, peeking around him to get a load of the problem.  And your heart freezes.  Vriska’s leaning against Tavros’s door, messing around on her phone. What the fuck what is she doing here?  Has she been waiting this whole time?  What does she want?  Oh, god, is she gonna try to start something here in the middle of the hallway, because you swear to fuck if shit starts to go down you’re gonna—

“Tavros, what the hell?” she says, pushing herself away from the door.

“Uh,” he says. You don’t say anything.

“This is the second time you’ve left me waiting outside your apartment like an idiot!” she says, walking over to stand in front of him with her arms crossed.

“Um,” he says. You still don’t say anything.

Her eyes flash to you and then back to him.  You can’t see his face.  Before you can really think about it, you lay your hand gently against his back.  You feel his muscles shift beneath your palm.

“Did you have a good night out?” she asks.

“Yes,” he says. Finally, words. And it almost sounds defiant, much to your surprise and delight.  Hell yeah, stick it to her.

“Who’s your friend?” she asks, nodding at you.

“Dave Strider,” you say with a nod of your own.  “I’m his neighbor.  Now that introductions are out of the way, we really should be calling it a night, since we’re both running on empty.”

“Uh, yeah, what he said,” Tavros agrees with a nod.  A flood of relief bulldozes through you.  You rub your thumb against his back.

“Tavros, I’ve been waiting here for hours,” Vriska says with a frown.  “I’m just here to apologize, okay?  I just want to talk.”

“Uh, well, that’s...um,” he says, pulling the plug on your relief.  Goddamn it.

“Little late for that, don’t you think?” you supply for him before he stumbles into a phrase he’ll regret later.  Her eyes snap to you and narrow.  She’s like a snake. Or a spider.  Some nasty predator that serves as nightmare fodder for small children.  And for you, apparently.  But you hold your ground.

“Strider, right? Why don’t you mind your own business?”

“My bro’s business is my business.”

“I’m pretty sure your ‘bro’s’ business is his own business, by definition of the phrase ‘his business.’”

“Then I’m making it my business.”

“What do you think I’m going to do?  Hurt him? I didn’t stand alone in a hallway hotter than an oven to be a huge bitch.”

“I don’t really care why you’re here, frankly.  He’s—“

“Uh, hey, Dave?” Tavros interrupts, and your hand loses contact with his back as he turns to you. You look at him with surprise. He raises his hands, and there’s an apology in his smile, like he’s gonna say something he knows you won’t like.  You freeze.

“Oh no,” you say.

“It’s just a talk,” he says.

“Oh no no no,” you say.

“It’s not a big deal, really, and after what you said today, remember?  I’m the bigger man here, so it’s fine.”

“Nope, no, uh-uh.”

“I’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?”

“Tavros, _no_.”

His whole face is an apology. The way he holds his body, the little smile he gives you as he turns away and walks over to open his door, the little glance he sends you as he lets Vriska walk in ahead of him, it’s all one big fucking apology.  You don’t even move as the door swings shut.  You can’t even believe it. He let her back into his apartment, after all that. He fucking let her in.


	5. Chapter 5

It’s hotter than the fires of hell in your room, even with the window open and the fan on and most of your gross, sweaty clothes peeled off, and, frankly, you’d rather just be in hell. You can hear damn near close enough to everything happening next door, the muffled whispers and startled gasps and sometimes a moan when things get loud enough.  The cacophony of intimate noises filtering through the paper-thin walls between your room and Tavros’s is decibels louder than it used to be, back in the golden days when everything was peaches and cream. You don’t know if you’ve turned into a whiny pissbaby or if the walls have just magically grown thinner. Either possibility is as likely as the other for all you know.  You tell yourself that it’s probably because the window is open, even though the window being open is nowhere near a novel occurrence in your apartment. Maybe his is, too, and that makes the difference.  You wouldn’t be surprised.  You’d both slowly asphyxiate on the hot, dense air in your rooms if you didn’t get a little breeze circulating the air now and then.  Slow, agonizing asphyxiation sounds like a tempting idea, now that you think of it.  You could get up and slam the window shut, lie back down and just bake in peace, maybe with some earphones in to cut out the rest of the noise.  You’d be left to the soothing lullaby of hard, angry music and the much less soothing memories of the exact noises you’re trying to ignore.

You used to get online sometimes and pester Egbert about the sicknasty business going on next door, once upon a time before you were personally invested.  Jokes would fly.  You’d write pages of rude play by plays spiced up with your own personal touches fresh from your overactive imagination, always upping the ante to draw some hilarious reaction from John.  “Dude, gross!!” he’d type back, and everything was great and funny and generally light-hearted.  Maybe you should message him now and see how it goes.  “Yo, dude, check it, my chicken shit neighbor is getting it on with his abusive girlfriend and it’s totally amusing. They’re really going at it. Ha ha, fucking sick.”

A particularly loud sound, something you might imagine emerging from the jaws of a damned soul that’s gone through too many rounds in the fiery pits to really put any oomph into their overdramatic groans, cuts through the wall and brings little shivers to your skin.  She’s laying it on heavy tonight.  Sure, she’s so loud outside of the bedroom that you’d almost expect her to sound like a possessed porn star in need of an immediate exorcism when engaged in the nasty dance, but it’s so obvious she’s doing it on purpose.  It’s like she wants everyone in the whole fucking building to hear.  You wouldn’t put it past her, to be honest.  It’s about the closest she can get to literally branding her name onto his forehead while still being relatively legal about it.  If it’s even illegal at all to brand someone on the forehead.  Hell, people have done weirder things to their faces. Maybe Tavros has enough sense to draw the line at possessive face mutilations, or maybe she’s not that tacky. Besides, he’s got a nice face, right? Wouldn’t want to ruin his good looks. You’re surprised she hasn’t at least bought him a collar yet, though.  That’d be one way to let everyone know that she fucking owns him like a goddamn dog and no one can do a thing about it.

Tavros can get pretty noisy, too.  But that’s just the way his voice is, the way it starts out soft and rises in pitch with all the faltering grace of a bird after it’s hit a window.  He gets breathy and shallow in no time at all and it’s all downhill from there, throaty whines and short little sounds you don’t even know how to describe without repeating them out loud to yourself.  You bet he blushes every time.  It probably always starts at his ears.

Hell, maybe he does wear a collar in the bedroom.  Maybe she ties him up, just fucking decks him out in fancy ropework like a spider wrapping up its prey in a pretty little web before it sinks its fangs in. You bet she’d be into that sort of thing. Cock rings, sounding rods, nipple clamps, strap-ons, leather, maybe some fuzzy handcuffs or some shit. At least she’s not hitting him. You’d hear that. But you know enough now to picture Tavros in some naughty adult Peter Pan get-up, bound and kneeling at the feet of a finally victorious and way too smug Captain Hook. The possibilities are endless, and they all lodge themselves into your brain as the sounds coming through the wall rise and fall, and you feel a heat that has nothing to do with summer sneak up your torso.  Your hand plays with the waistband of your boxers.

You’re not really into that sort of thing.  Bondage? Nah.  You’ll stick with your garden variety love sex, sans the sub/dom interplay and the demeaning dirty talk.  But that’s not what your persistent hard-on is telling you.  And your track record for keeping your hands off yourself and being a good ironic Christian when the familiar soundtrack picks up next door sure as hell can’t back you up. Fuck it, it’s time to face facts, Dave Strider.  You’re a fucking pervert, a shameless eavesdropper crouching in the shadows like the cameraman of a porno trying not to beat his meat while the main cast gets down and dirty, pretending like they don’t know you’re here.  And your hand slips under your waistband, because it does sound like a porno, and you’ve got a porno going on in your head that’s probably miles removed from what’s actually happening next door, and you might as well cash in on the free entertainment while you got it, ‘cause it’s not going away any time soon.  The days when you could roll your eyes and turn the music up are long gone.  You know him now.  You can’t stop yourself from thinking about what they look like with their clothes off, where they’re putting their hands, how his hair looks slick with sweat, his copper eyes when he reaches his peak, what he tastes like—

And you’re up marching to the bathroom to take a long cold shower because what the fuck dude what the fuck what the _fuck._

This isn’t the first time you’ve taken refuge beneath a cool stream of water in the past few weeks, but usually you wait it out until they’re done.  And you’re done.  You tell yourself you’re just lonely and horny.  You’re a single young adult with no real sexual experiences to speak of.  It’s natural. No one bats an eye when dudes like you watch online videos of two consenting adults getting it on, so what’s the big deal?  And all that stuff about Tavros...it’s nothing.  You just miss him is all.  This is the only time you hear his voice anymore. 

How long has it been since you talked?  You rest your head against the shower wall and think back.  A couple weeks, at least.  You haven’t hung out in ages.  It wasn’t a huge deal at first, when he and Vriska ‘made up.’ She ‘apologized.’ They were ‘just friends.’ And then there was what you might refer to as the honeymoon phase, when Tavros seemed really pretty happy with the way things turned out, and you were enough of an idiot to buy into the idea that, hey, maybe this was okay.  And then she stayed the night at his place.  God, you still remember the absolutely sickening feeling you got when you heard the familiar set of sounds start up.  You were sure you were wrong.  But nope.  You weren’t wrong.  No denying it, no saving face, no two ways about it.  And he said less to you after that, because he knew you knew. And because you knew he knew you knew, you said less to him.  And he said less, and you said less, so on, forever, until now, here you are, with your head against the shower wall, full of all sorts of shitty emotions you don’t want to have over the fact that you only get to hear his voice when he’s fucking his bitch girlfriend.  And you miss him.

You wonder if he loves her. If he thinks he loves her. Can a person love someone who fucks them up that bad?  You want to say no, it’s all a huge lie, it’s a mystery why he lets her back into his life again and again, because you know for a fact this isn’t the first time. But fuck, you of all people don’t really have the right to say anything, do you?  You’ve been thinking about a lot of things. About you, and him, and her, and everyone else you know.  You’ve come to the conclusion that you don’t know a goddamn thing about love or loving people or what it feels like to _be_ loved.  Maybe he does love her.  Maybe he admires her. Vriska’s got the force of personality to make the world spin the other way if she wanted, and she’d insist all the natural disasters that would occur as a result weren’t her fault. That seems like something Tavros would want, that sort of unbelievable confidence.  And can you really blame the guy?  You know someone else just like that, and you’ve spent most of your life practically worshipping him.  And you never thought a thing about it before now, despite all the weird-ass shit you dealt with growing up that you’re beginning to realize maybe isn’t as rad as you thought it was.  Yeah, no, love doesn’t make a damn bit of sense to you anymore.

All of it’s got you fucked up. You’re so confused. You don’t even know how to say all the ways you’re confused, and you haven’t, even though all your friends have been pestering the hell out of you about it.  You guess something must be off about the way you’ve been chatting or keeping your blog or whatever.  You are two weeks behind on SBAHJ.  Rose managed to pry something out of you about Tavros and his problems and your problems with his problems through all your cagey verbal acrobatics and Freudian slips.  And she wanted to know what part of it bothers you most.  That Tavros didn’t turn out to be the person you thought he was? But that’s not really it, because honestly, as much as you hate every decision he’s made lately and think he has his head shoved firmly up his ass, you can’t say you’re shocked. Like, the warning signs were there, and you chose to pretend that they didn’t apply anymore to him for whatever the fuck reason you had for that massive oversight.  And then she asked if it was about you, that _you’re_ not the person that you thought you were.  And...yeah? Yeah, that bothers you, obviously. You made a lot of presumptions about yourself that you’re starting to reconsider, and by the end of the conversation, you were thinking maybe that’s what got your goat about the whole deal.  But it’s more than that.  It’s you, but also everything around you and how it all meshes together.

The thing is, nobody in your apartment complex speaks up about the shit they hear go down. No one knocks on doors or prods into anyone else’s personal business, no one asks questions or demands answers for obvious problems or misconduct.  You never wondered why before now.  It never bothered you.  Clearly that’s just the way the shit gets kicked in your neighborhood.  You always thought you liked it that way, people minding their own business and pretending like they didn’t hear every shameful thing that happened in the living spaces next to theirs.  You liked to live the illusion that you could save face when you opened your front door and stepped out into the public. 

But now, it does bother you. It really fucking bothers you. Hell, when you were a kid, six years old, nine years old, twelve, fifteen, you’d think someone would’ve had the sense to knock on your door and say something to your Bro, right? “Sorry to bother you, Mr. Bro Strider, but do you really think you should be beating the shit out of your kid brother on the roof every other week?”  Or maybe, “I noticed you run a puppet pornography site with all the trappings, the full nine yards, fluff to snuff, right out of your living room...maybe that’s not really stellar for the little man’s development, you know what I mean?”  But no, that never happened.  Not once. And now, as a grown man yourself, legally an actual fucking adult, you wonder why that is. Why didn’t anyone say anything? Why did you all collectively decide that this is the way you wanted to build a community?  Why the fuck is this just now becoming something you find disconcerting? 

And the wild thing, the thing that gets back into all of this, into you and Tavros and love and everything else, is that you’re the exact same goddamn way.  You know that now.  You bought into it so much, the mentality that other people are best left to their own devices and you to yours, that you never realized how fucked up it all is.  How many times did you hear that banshee’s voice slice through the wall with some rude shit and you just turned up the volume on your TV, no questions asked, it’s none of your business anyway?  God, you can’t even count.  That’s how it always was, for months.  Fucking _months_.  You used to think it was fucking _funny_ , in a warped, ironic sort of way.  Oops, there she goes again.  Wonder what shred of self-worth she’s going to destroy today.  Poor kid. Wrapped around his crazy girlfriend’s finger, haha.  He’s so whipped! What a pussy.  You remember thinking those things as you turned the volume up just a notch higher.  What the actual fuck?

And you know, yeah, you’re mad at Tavros, because he let himself get roped back in and he dropped you like a ragdoll afterwards, like you never mattered at all in the first place. It fucking hurts. But you live the life, too, with Bro, idolizing someone who you’re just starting to realize is maybe just as fucked up in a different way.  So the pain is bearable.  What really hurts, what hurts right down to the core of who you are, is that you haven’t done a damn thing about it.  Why can’t you knock?  Why can’t you tell her to go fuck herself?  Why is that, despite the fact that you’ve acknowledged the existence of this bizarre social contract preventing people from flagging shitty, abusive behavior and denounced it, it’s still so hard for you to square your shoulders and march over to his doorway, the same doorway you used to beat on every day for a bit of social interaction, to fucking kick that door in and say, “Hey, what the fuck is wrong with you, you actual fucking bitch?” 

You wonder if he’s as disappointed in you as you are in him.  If he thinks about how you just jumped ship when things started to get rocky. He knows you can hear it all. And you know he knows. And...knowing that he knows that you’re just chilling in your room with your cold glass of AJ, blogging like nothing’s wrong, you can’t fucking stand yourself.  You should be the hero here, ready or at least somewhat willing to stand up for Tavros since you know he’s not going to stand up for himself, but you’re not.  You’re not a hero. You’re not even a good friend. You don’t know if you deserve to be anything more than that.

You don’t understand anything anymore. Least of all yourself. Every time you think you’re piecing something together and figuring it all out, you find yourself standing in your shower staring at your feet, wondering why you feel like you’re drowning when you finish off to the sound of him reaching orgasm on the other side of the fucking wall.


	6. Chapter 6

You don’t know how to tell Bro you don’t want to strife anymore.  Hell, you don’t even know if that’s an option.  You could leave a note on his turntables, like a two-week notice that you’re ducking out of the shitty family business of pointless ass whoopings, but you bet the only thing that’d earn you is another pointless ass whooping.  And you know he’d just fuck with you all the time to draw you up to the roof. He’d steal your shit, mess with your head, maybe stock the kitchen with even less food than what’s already in it.  You could confront him about it like a goddamn man and put your foot down, but you’ve already come to the conclusion that you’re not really that kind of guy.  The putting the foot down and being a man kind of guy. Instead, you’re the kind of guy who goes through the motions with as little energy as possible without completely collapsing into a boneless heap like one of your Bro’s puppets the second he pulls a sword out.  You think he’s noticed. 

“What’s up?” he asks after he’s successfully handed your ass to you without so much as breaking a sweat. You were actually getting close to landing some pretty respectable blows on him several months ago, before you turned into whatever it is you are now.

“I got my ass kicked,” you say.  That’s what’s up. You don’t bother standing when he comes to loom over you.  You can’t see his face the way it’s dark against the orange sky, but it’s not like it would matter anyway.  Probably looks like it always does.

“You sure did. Care to tell me why?” he asks.

“I think it’s been pretty well established over the course of literally my entire life that I get my ass kicked because you’re better than I am,” you say.  He doesn’t respond immediately.  Just stares down at you, the way he does when he’s got something on his mind.  Don’t ask you what’s on his mind.  You’ve never known the answer to that little mystery.  You just know what the signs look like.

“You’ve been out of it lately,” he finally says.

Well, fuck. You knew he’d notice eventually, but you didn’t really think he’d say anything about it.  You don’t have a reply for him, and somehow the prospect of actually saying anything about the undercurrent of shit that’s been eroding away your peace of mind makes your gut squeeze and twist in all the worst ways. God, you fucking hate it. You hate it all.

“I don’t want to strife anymore,” you say.  Everything in your torso freezes at once with some special kind of terror you’ve never really had to actively acknowledge like this before.  You didn’t really mean to say it.  You don’t know why you did.  It just slipped out.  Goddamn it, why do words do that so much?  You stay still, trying to keep your face under control. The sweat on your forehead feels cold.  You hate it you fucking hate it goddamn you hate it.

You barely control a flinch when Bro lowers himself down to sit next to you.

“You’re holding out on me, lil’ man,” he says.  You can see his face better now.  Still the same, but not like you expected it’d be.  Like, there are different shades of the same face, but this one is not the one you were afraid to see.  You don’t know what that means.  You can’t really find the energy to work it out. The cold panic that settled into you when you blurted out your shit begins to trickle away and it’s taking your energy with it.

“I’m just mad tired of getting my ass handed to me all the time,” you finally say.  “What is this even supposed to accomplish? You’ve been literally kicking the shit out of me since I was old enough to lift my fragile baby cranium off the ground, and I still can’t beat you.  I don’t know if I ever even wanted to beat you in the first place, or if I’ve been working towards that goal to make myself feel like I’ve got some part in this elaborate lifelong game to brutally thrash my ass on a regular basis.  Why are we even doing this?”

You don’t want to look at Bro while he comes up with an answer.  You have never in your life challenged him like this before. You’ve always been way about him. You’ve always idolized him, and why the hell not?  He was practically everything you wanted to be.  But not really anymore.  You don’t give a shit about participating in admittedly awesome kickass swordplay on the roof while the sun sets below the city skyline.  You’ve been focusing a little more on your bruises than the aesthetic lately.

“I was hoping you’d beat me someday,” he says.  So you really were supposed to usurp the master.  That...if you were in a better mood, that would be funny. “Also, practically speaking, I need a good sparring partner to stay in shape.  So do you.”

“So this was all a big plot to help me maintain my alluring figure,” you say.

“You know the state of obesity in America nowadays,” he replies.  It’s a joke.  That somehow makes you feel a little better.  A little less on edge at least.  But he’s got more to add, and it’s not all jokes.  “I’ve just been looking out for you, lil’ man,” he says. “A little strength and skill never hurt anyone.  Probably. Is this what you’ve been getting down about?”

Shit.  You take a deep breath.  Fuck, you almost ache.  “No,” you say.  “Kind of.  Not really. I just thought it was a little fucked up is all.  Since, you know, getting hardcore pummeled on the roof doesn’t seem like typical family funtime fare to most people.”

“We’re not really most people,” he says.  And that’s just not what you want to hear at all.

“What, because our beats are ill and we can move really fast?” you say.  You don’t need to say these things.  You don’t particularly want to.  But you can’t help it.  You really do fucking ache and you’ve been holding it in for way too long.  “Because we can spit out sicknasty verses on the fly and have a collective internet fanbase that could populate this whole fucking city without much marketable real estate left over?  Don’t get me wrong, I’m about all that stuff just as much as the next guy, but we fucking eat and sleep and breathe just like everyone else does, and it’s not like we’re such hot shit when it comes to the little things.  The things that matter more than all that.  Fuck, I don’t know what we are, but I sure as hell don’t feel like anything special just ‘cause I can wield a sword.”

Bro goes quiet again. Thinking or scheming or some shit, whatever he does.  You wish you knew what goes on in his head.  The guy’s a goddamn stone wall for all the emotion he shows, and it’s fucking exhausting to guess what kind of cogs are turning behind his stoic as shit face.  Is he mad? Is he offended? Did you hurt his feelings, if he even has any of those?  Christ, what’s going on in there? 

“You’ve got other shit going on,” he says.

Not a question. The phrase drops between you like a heavy ball of lead, and it stays there.  He doesn’t say anything else.  Moments pass in silence, so poignantly you can almost hear the ticking of some universal metaphysical clock.  He’s waiting for you to pick up the ball, but the ball sits right where he dropped it, stubbornly refusing to be picked up.  That ball’s not going anywhere soon. It’s just too heavy to be about moving.  Maybe if you stay sprawled on your back in obstinate silence, you can leave the ball exactly where it is forever and you’ll never have to actually explain yourself. That’d be great.

Bro sighs. It’s a quiet sound you’re not used to.  “You’re not hanging out with your friend anymore,” he comments.  Oh, god, you’d rather fucking melt into the tar of the roof and live out the rest of your life watching the sky piss on your face than talk about this.

“Yeah,” you say. The sound feels thick slipping out of your tight throat.  You used to be boss at keeping your emotions on lockdown.  Where’d the good days go?

“He came dancing with you that one night.”  You remember that night.  Shit, it must be all over your face.

“Yeah.”

“You haven’t been out much since.”

“Yeah.”  He knows.

“His girlfriend’s been back around.”

“Yeah.”  He has to know.

“She’s kind of a bitch.”

“A bit.”  Fuck, but what if he does know?

“Was he your only friend?”

Fuck.  Just fuck.  “I have friends on the internet.  You know, Egbert, Harley, Lalonde.”

“Why don’t you go visit one of them?”

Like you haven’t thought about that at least once a day for the past several years.  “They live hundreds of miles away and I don’t have a car,” you say.  “And it’s not like I can just move in with any of them and act like everything’s cool. ‘Hey, John, I’m gonna crash here until I forget about all my problems back home, so move your shit and make space for my turntables.’  As much as that sounds like a good idea to me, I don’t think it’d actually fly.”

“So how are you planning to fix all those problems, if you’re just going to stay here and mope?”

Fix them?  Yeah, there you go.  Just fix the problems.  Just fucking fix them.  Right. “I guess I’m gonna pet the poodle and blog about all my manly feelings.”

“That’s your plan?” One sassy eyebrow lifts just a hair.  What the fuck, what does he know about any of it?

“What the hell am I supposed to do?” you burst out.  “Shimmy my way over to his open window the next time he steps out and stage a surprise intervention with all his other fucktruck friends that are apparently also too chicken shit to do anything about it?  It’s not like I’ve been hells of supportive since she came back in the first place.  What good’s it gonna do for me now to pop out from behind a sofa yelling, ‘Break up with your girlfriend and for the love of fuck don’t get back together with her next time, you stupid shit!’  I fucked up, okay?  I haven’t even seen him in the hallways since like two weeks ago.  If he’s not avoiding me, he’s doing a hell of a good job of accidentally not existing within the same general space as I am.  It’s done.  I fucked up.  And even if he does break up with her, what—I don’t even have my own shit together, so what the fuck—what am I gonna—what are we even supposed to be?”

The sassy eyebrow isn’t so sassy anymore.  You said too much. You said way too much and now you’re like a window, you’re so transparent.  Like crystal.  Crystal clear, the most obvious dude on the block, that’s you. Everyone take a gander at Dave Strider, the fallen hero who was never a hero to begin with, who wears his heart on his sleeve and can’t not blurt out every secret he has.  So much for irony and cool aloof disinterest. You’re not cool. Were you ever really cool? Probably not.  You’re a fraud.  Might as well hit the road with a beat-up old suitcase and take up a questionable life swindling people.  You’ll be like that guy in _The Music Man_.  Stumble upon some ass backward Midwestern town and trick everyone into buying instruments and shit.  Find yourself a saucy piano teacher to help you through the slow redemption process. Maybe that’ll make up for all the nights you’ve spent jacking your sausage to the ex-friend you betrayed like an absolute coward.  The ex-friend who makes your heart hurt to shattering pieces when you think about him. Shit.

Well, anyway, time to get up and haul ass inside before Bro can make anything out of what you just said. “Dave—“ he starts, but check it, you can move fast when you want to.  Flashstep your way right to the stairs.  But not down them.  You’re not that foolhardy.

You know he’s right behind you, but you’re hoping he’ll drop it and never, ever bring it up again. You don’t know if he will. It’s not like you have a lot of these kinds of conversations about this kind of topics.  But if he’s as ashamed of you as you are of yourself, maybe he’ll actually be the guardian he’s supposed to be and sit you down for an authoritative attitude adjustment.

Yeah, no, that won’t happen. You can consider yourself safe for now.  Whatever that means. More things you don’t understand but fucking hate.

You get your keys out as you hop down onto your landing, and when you look up, your mind does the worst flinch-wince-explode x3combo imaginable.  You don’t know if Tavros is coming or going or what, but he apparently didn’t expect to see you any more than you expected to see him. And here you are, sweaty and probably bleeding somewhere, maybe with a fresh bruise or two, your sword swung over your shoulder like a badass.  You don’t feel like a badass.  You feel like you could just let your knees go out and flop over into the next stairwell to fall bonelessly the rest of the way down the apartment complex. And you can feel Bro right behind you, soundlessly descending the last few stairs.  What god did you piss off to deserve this?

You almost jump when a hand claps down on your shoulder.  “I’ll go whip you up some AJ,” Bro says.  “Your friend is welcome to join.”  And then he flashsteps around the both of you to your apartment, disappearing inside in record time.  You didn’t even see him get his keys out.

“Uh,” Tavros says. Fuck.  Fuckity fucking FUCK.

“Yo,” you say. You sound so chill. Like you haven’t been beating yourself up for way too long over the unreal loads of guilt and regret you’ve been hording.  Man, you’re so fake.

“Hey, Dave. How, uh...what’s up?” he says. He locks his door. So he’s leaving. That’s...a relief? You won’t have to close this conversation with both of you awkwardly slumping into your respective abodes like strangers, at least.  You try to use that thought to help you relax a little.

“Nothing much,” you say. “Just got done with some...training, or whatever.  With Bro.”

“Yeah, um, I noticed.” His eyes dart over your body. You feel so gross. You must smell. Ugh, why.  Just why.  “It looks like you got a good workout, though.”

“I lost,” you say.

“Oh,” he says. Like he really knows what that means, with reference to you and Bro.  You told him a little bit about your ‘sparring,’ so maybe he kind of does, but there’s no way he really gets it.  He didn’t live here when you were a kid.  “Well, uh, that’s okay, since there’s always next time to try.”

Are you fucking kidding. He offers you a supportive albeit awkward smile, probably to cheer you up.  Maybe he’s thinking about your conversation in the diner, after all this time.  Goddamn it. “I’m not about it,” you say, and man, you really aren’t right now.

“Oh,” he says again. Wow.  You’re really at your best.  Top form Dave Strider.  All he can say is, ‘oh.’  His brow furrows, and you really can’t blame him at all, but then he says, “Um, I noticed that, your blog, uh, doesn’t seem to be as active lately, and...is everything okay?”

It’s like he punched you. Right in the gut. A swift uppercut to the solar plexus, right underneath your diaphragm, hard enough to knock all the wind out of you and leave you with that awful nauseating feeling that doesn’t go away for at least an hour.  “I’m all aces,” you say.  “Great. Feeling pretty awesome. Just dandy.”  His eyebrows draw down a little more, confused or concerned or some other thing you don’t like, and you say, “Hey, let’s talk about your life.  What have you been up to?  Got anything good going on?  Still working those jobs?”

“Oh, yeah, I am,” he says, and some of the concern melts into something like excitement.  “But, actually, I’m doing something else now, in that I’m going to start taking classes soon.  Or maybe not soon, since I’m just now applying to community college, so I’m getting ahead of myself.  Sorry.  But yes, I think that qualifies as a good thing that I’ve been up to.”

“Oh shit,” you say, and for a second you’re pretty effectively distracted.  “That’s awesome.”

“Yeah, I think so as well,” he says, beaming.  He’s really pleased about it.  You can tell this is a big deal to him, the way his eyes just glow.  Your heart thumps in your chest.  Fuck, you missed that smile.  “I’ve been wanting to go to college for a long time now, but with my financial situation, and working my jobs, I haven’t been able to, so this is a really good opportunity that I’m glad I finally got.”

“Hell yeah, that’s legit,” you say.  “What are you gonna study?”

“I haven’t decided yet, but maybe something related to animals, like biology, or perhaps folklore.”

You nod.  “Sounds about right.  Either of those would probably work pretty well for you.”

“Yeah, I think I would like either option equally well, but right now, I’m leaning more towards the biology option, since, um...”  And just like that, his excitement melts away, and an entirely different emotion sneaks into his expression.  His smile slips. His hands snake forward to intertwine, and he’s ringing his fingers.  And you come crashing down.

“Yeah?” you ask, like you want to know.  You’re not sure you do.

“Well, uh, Vriska just thinks biology is more practical, and that folklore is a stupid thing to study, since I probably won’t be exceptional enough with my work to find a job and it has no real applications...also, since I would probably have to go to graduate school, and since she’s, um...paying part of the way for me, that’s a concern of hers, which I understand, so...”

 _Fuck_ , what?  She’s _paying_ for his schooling?  Like, what, some sort of sugar mama?  There has to be a sinister ulterior motive there. Like indentured servant type shit, just drill him into debt so he can never leave, right?  But...fuck, he wants to go to college. Maybe she’s just being his girlfriend and giving him a lift when he needs it.  Maybe they’re getting serious.  Shit, you can’t compete with that.  It’s not like you can drop some funds to help him get educated. For better or worse, he’s entirely hers on this front.  Like he always is.

Some kind of shitty void is filling up your chest, like everything else is getting sucked up into a black hole where your heart was a minute ago, and you just let it slip. “Do you love her?” you ask. You don’t even have the energy to regret it.  Maybe you don’t. Maybe you really want to know.

“Uh,” he says, and you can see on his face that the question came right out of left field for him, totally unexpected, landing square in the ‘what the fuck’ zone you’ve been pretty much exclusively existing within for weeks now.  He’s struggling to process the question and make sense of what it means, let alone formulate an answer.  You wonder if he’s ever thought about it before. Maybe he has but never expected to say the answer out loud to anyone.  Maybe this isn’t a question he’d ever thought he’d be asked. His poor fingers are working overtime to wring themselves out of their skin.  “...Sometimes?” he finally says.  Sometimes.  What the hell does that mean?

“So yes?”

“Uh...um...” He takes a deep breath. “Sometimes...I love her a lot, I think, in ways I understand a little bit, and other times, I...don’t know.”

You can’t help it. You reach out and undo the knot he’s made of his fingers, because it’s driving you up the fucking wall. He’s driving you up the fucking wall. You don’t understand. But you do.  But you don’t want to.  “Tavros,” you say.  There’s all sorts of things that were supposed to follow that, but they all get stuck on the way out, like a traffic jam in your vocal cords, with all the necessary road rage and pollution.  Your windpipes are getting clogged by mad amounts of verbal exhaust, suffocating you with a special sort of carbon monoxide.  You take a deep breath.  “If you’re gonna get serious with her—and I mean the kind of serious where she’s dropping mad cash for you, and you’re in a position where you gotta honor that—you have to, just...know.  Whether or not you love her.  Please. And at least remember she’s not always fucking right, okay?”

He doesn’t say anything. Your hand is on his hands, and he looks down at them, some sort of expression you don’t want to try picking apart on his face.  You don’t know if you have the right to be here saying these things.  Just a moment ago, he was all excited to tell you he’s going to take classes, and now you’re saying, what, don’t?  But what if this is the only opportunity he gets? What then?  You don’t know his life.  Not really.  But, shit, you want to.  You want to understand him and why he’s this way and how he can stop being this way.  You want to help him fix all his fucking problems.  You want him to fucking know when he loves someone and to know when he’s being loved, and you want to know what it feels like to be loved and what it feels like to love someone else and to know when you’re in love and what that means. You want to just...be in love with someone who loves you back instead of whatever this clusterfuck is you’re wading through now.  You don’t know what to do.  You’re standing here with your hand on his, and you don’t know what to do.  You drop your hand.

“I have to go to work,” he says as soon as your hand falls.

“Yeah, that’s cool,” you say.

He looks up at you. If you didn’t know he can’t see beyond your shades, you’d say he was looking you straight in the eyes. You wonder if he’d like your irises as much as you like his.  “I’ll...consider the things you said,” he says.

“Yeah, thanks,” you say. Like an idiot. He drops his eyes and turns away, and you can feel yourself shriveling up, because you wonder how long you’ll have to wait to talk to him again.  “Tavros,” you say before he reaches the stairs. He glances at you. “Hey.  You can still knock, you know, if you need a place.”

He smiles, soft and maybe grateful, fuck if you know.  It’s just a smile.  He always smiles. “Thanks,” he says, and he’s gone.


	7. Chapter 7

Bro’s in tonight. You’re watching him play a game. On the other side of the wall, Vriska’s going on about something, but not in a mad sort of way. Just in a Vriska sort of way. You hate that you know what that means, even though you’ve never once hung out with her.  You can’t really hear what she’s saying thanks to the volume on the TV and the earphones you snuck in the second you heard her start talking, but that’s the way you like it.  You’d almost be able to ignore her completely if it weren’t for Bro.  You’ve got the feeling that he’s keeping an eye on you somehow, even though he’s not looking at you at all or saying anything or showing any signs that he’s thinking about anything other than the video game he’s playing.  Maybe he’s just a little tense in the shoulders. Fuck if you know. You’re not really gonna turn and stare at him long enough to contemplate what part of his demeanor is cuing you into the fact that he’s totally monitoring your reaction to the disembodied voice from next door.  It’s just a hunch you have.  An irritating hunch that’s getting on your nerves.  Maybe you’ll move to your bedroom and chill online instead.

You’re really thinking about getting an AJ and holing up for the night when Tavros says something next door and the tone does a one-eighty.  Vriska stops talking for a beat.  Tavros says something else.  And when Vriska responds, she’s got a cutting edge to her voice, the familiar slice-n-dice sneer set to stun and silence.  You know what this is.  A storm’s brewing, and you’re a seasoned weatherman watching the cold front blow in.  Call the local emergency services, ‘cause we’re putting a severe weather watch in place. Sure enough, Tavros grumbles something back, quiet but defiant, and all the conditions have been met. The argument rumbles into a tempest, the likes of which even seasoned sailors have never seen before. Hold on, Captain Ahab, this one’s going to be a doozy.

If you move to your room now, you won’t have the TV to drown it out.  And there’s the off chance that make-up sex will be involved, which is something you don’t want to hear tonight.  You press back into the seat cushions and turn up the volume on your music until you can’t hear anything anymore.  Hey, maybe you’ll just go deaf.  That’d be nice.

You close your eyes and try to imagine what it’d be like to visit Jade on her island. Just you, a good friend, a radioactive dog, and a fuckton of plants.  You could be about that life.  You bet there’s some interesting dead shit in the ruins next to her place. Your music doesn’t really fit with the pacific island aesthetic, but fuck it, rap is always appropriate. Maybe you could convince Jade to learn how to play the ukulele and write up some ironic island-style raps. That’d be pretty funny. You’ll have to put that idea on the table for her later when you—

The couch shifts next to you, and your eyes snap open.  Bro is at the door, undoing the locks.  You wrench your earphones out as the door swings open.  Both Tavros and Vriska are on the other side, looking all kinds of harassed, and they stop talking when they see who’s at the door.

“Uh,” Tavros says, obviously thrown for a loop, “sorry, but...is Dave around?”

“Nice job, genius,” Vriska sneers.  “Why don’t you disturb everyone else on the floor while you’re at it?”

You’re at the door in a flash. “Yo, I’m here,” you say. You can see the relief on Tavros’s face.

“Hi, Dave, um...can I hang out here?” he asks, and Vriska throws her hands up in a huff and rolls her eyes.

“I’m assuming you mean without her,” you say, nodding to Vriska.

“No, he just decided now would be a great time to introduce us more formally,” Vriska says with such thick sarcasm you could probably drown a whale in it.  “Look, let’s all just agree that this was stupid and pretend like it didn’t happen.  I’m sure Tavros didn’t mean to be a huge asshole and ruin your night.”

“Okay, no, I’m not going to let you make me feel self-conscious about seeking sanctuary when you’re being objectively awful,” Tavros says, taking a step away from her. “And, anyway, Dave said I could come over, if I needed to for any reason.  Right?”

He glances at you, and you immediately nod.  “I can verify that.  That is definitely something that I said, practically verbatim.”

“See?”

“Tavros,” Vriska says, releasing a huge sigh, “you’re blowing this waaaaaaaay out of proportion. You don’t need to ‘seek sanctuary’ or anything like that.  You’re just being a huge baby over something completely insignificant, like always. Would you just quit wasting everyone’s time and go back inside?”

“No,” he says, in a stubborn way that almost does seem kind of childish.  But you’re glad.  You’re so fucking glad.

“Tavros, I swear to god—“

“It sounds to me like he knows what he’s about,” Bro says from beside you, and everyone immediately stops talking.  You look at him in surprise.  He has his arms crossed so that his ripped biceps fill out his sleeves, and with his shades covering up his eyes, he looks like some sort of badass bouncer.

“And you are...?” Vriska asks, eyeing him up and down. 

“I’m about to be all kinds of stern if you think you’re going to bring your bullshit into my crib,” he says. Oh shit.  Oh goddamn.  Oh fuck _yes_ , it’s about to get real.  You’ve never seen it get real before.  Not firsthand. You exchange glances with Tavros, and you can tell by the look on his face that he feels the same way.

“What are you gonna do about it?” Vriska asks, squaring her shoulders.  Damn, she’s not afraid of anything.  Bro’s like a foot taller than she is.

“Here’s what’s going to happen,” he says, coolly, like a guy who knows he has everything under control. “Your man is going to come into my apartment and hang out with my lil’ bro, since he’s a grown ass adult who clearly stated his wishes and my bro explicitly invited him over to hang out. You are going to respect that and leave.  I don’t care where you go, but you’re not coming inside, and you’re not going to prevent him from coming inside.”

“And what if I refuse?” she asks.

“I invite you to find out.” Bro uncrosses his arms and straightens his back a little, and god _damn_ you don’t even know if you’re ready to witness this standoff because it is going to be all kinds of sick.  Not that you really _want_ Bro to take it to head and actually strife with Tavros’s abusive girlfriend, but...well, okay, maybe you do want that to happen a little bit, but you’ve got the decency to know that it probably shouldn’t. 

“How about we not all act like steroid pumping hardasses,” you say, taking a step forward. You slide yourself between Tavros and Vriska, reaching behind you to nudge Tavros towards the door. “Look, sometimes you just gotta let your boyfriend hang out with other people.  Especially after you’ve spent the last half hour or whatever tearing him a new asshole.”

“Actually, I’m not her boyfriend anymore, on account of the fact that I just broke up with her, before coming over,” Tavros says as he backs up into your apartment.

“Even better!” you say, pushing in after him.  “In that case, I hope we never see you again.  It was terrible meeting you.  Bye.” And you shut the door in her face.

You wait with your hand on the knob until you hear her footsteps stomp back into Tavros’s apartment and out again.  She slams the door behind her.  Everyone is quiet as the footsteps fade down the stairs.  Your blood is rushing in your ears.  He broke up with her.  He fucking broke up with her.

“Sorry...about that,” Tavros finally says when you continue to stand half-stunned next to the door.

“You broke up with her.”

He sighs and says, “Yeah, I did,” but not as triumphantly as you would expect.  It strikes you that maybe breaking up with a girlfriend is not always an automatic cause for celebration for some people, and you tone it down a bit.  Not that you were going apeshit and throwing confetti.  Yet.  “She wanted me to move in with her, and...I guess, after what you said, and the way she was talking, like with the bossy words, I made a quick decision suddenly that I wasn’t very happy, and that...maybe I wouldn’t be, ever, if I kept doing the same thing continuously.”

“Well, fuck,” you say, because you don’t know what else to say that would be considered appropriately supportive.  But then it hits you.  “Wait, what about college?”

He grimaces and lets out a sigh that actually does manage to sober you up a bit.  “I guess...I can try to save money, still, like I have been doing.  But that’s okay. It’s not terrible, the way life is now, and, realistically, it’s probably better to pay my own way through college anyway.”

“Have you tried getting loans?” you ask.

“Uh, well, that’s a difficult issue, since my family’s credit is not really the best...”

“Shit.”

“How much do you pay for rent?” Bro asks.  Tavros is so taken aback to hear Bro actually talk to him that he almost jumps.  “$800?”

“Uh,” Tavros says, still recovering.  Maybe you talked Bro up too much.  Tavros glances at you before nodding.  “Yeah, around that much.”

“Move in with us and save yourself some money.”

If you hadn’t spent most of your life mastering complete control over your facial muscles, your jaw would have dropped.  You think maybe it did a little bit anyway, just to drive home how absolutely unbelievably fucking shocked you are.  Where the hell did this come from?  It’s not exactly commonplace for Bro to invite complete strangers to jam with you in your chaotic dump of a bachelor pad.

“Uh, is that...is that okay?” Tavros asks, and his eyes are like fucking cueballs they’re so enormous. He looks at you, and you honestly have fuckall to contribute to the conversation because you don’t know what’s happening any more than he does.

“You’d have to room with Dave,” Bro says.  “Depending on how much stuff you have, you may have to put some of it in storage.”

“Are you—I mean, that is to say, is this really something that—uh, Dave, is this okay?”

“If Bro says it’s cool, it’s cool,” you finally manage.  Because what else can you say?  This is un-fucking-real.  A week ago you were rotting from the inside out over Tavros and your existential angst, and now he’s ditching his shitty relationship and he’s going to be moving in to save money so he can go to college?  Hell, if you can provide any sort of assistance to be about helping him accomplish that dream, you’re down.  And if he’s staying at your place, the likelihood of him getting back together with Vriska is close to nothing, right?  Okay, that might be making too many presumptions, but you can at least influence that outcome a little more than before. So...what, is this gonna be a thing?

“Are you sure it’s okay?” Tavros asks.  You glance at Bro. He flashes you a thumbs up.

“We’re doing it, man,” you say.

“We’re making this happen,” Bro finishes.  “Why don’t you go get your essentials and we’ll figure out how to fit you in.”

Tavros gapes at you as it sets in, and watching the grin dawn on his face is literally the best thing you’ve done in weeks.  He’s all glee as he rushes over to his apartment to start gathering his things together. When the door clicks shut, you turn to Bro.

“What the hell?” you ask, because you really don’t know what else to say.  He shrugs.

“You didn’t have a plan to fix your problems, so I did.”

“Wait, you mean—“

“Don’t worry about it. But if I were you, I’d make sure he swings both ways before getting any more invested.  That’s your deal, kid.”

And that’s it. All bets are off. Your face is doing whatever the hell it wants, and it’s not within your power to stop it.  It’s anarchy, pure and simple.  Everything you thought you knew has splintered to pieces, and you don't understand anything anymore.  You expected something to happen when Bro figured it out, some reaction or blowback, but this is it?  ‘Hey good luck don’t ruin it by hitting on someone who’s not into dudes the way you apparently are now’?  Isn’t he going to comment?  Maybe drop some sort of bullshit about errant sexual deviancy?  Get in your face with some masculinity-fueled social expectations?  _Something_? Isn’t this a Big Deal? It was to you, when you started to tune in and figure everything out.  Or you thought it was.  You were carrying some mad baggage about this shit.  Now you don’t know.  Is it a big deal?  Were you getting carried away?  Fuck.

“Is this why you’re sticking him in my room?” you ask.  You don’t know what to think anymore.

“It’s a surefire way to get something worked out,” he says.  “By the way, you should think about enrolling in classes, too. You can’t freeload around here forever.  Ask Tavros about it. I’ll cover the costs.”

“Yeah.  Okay.  Cool.”

“Might wanna go move some of your crap around,” he says, and he weaves around the couch to resume his game. You don’t really have any reason to argue.  You head to your room and spend most of the time until Tavros reappears staring at your furniture and trying to imagine Tavros’s shit mixed in with yours.  The space is small, but you’ll somehow fit. All Tavros brought with him for now are some clothes and bathroom supplies, but that’s all he needs anyway. You technically won’t have to start moving until he gets everything squared away with the landlord. You think he knows that, but even if he doesn’t, you want to believe he’s down to hang.

You both squeeze in and spend most of the night catching up.  It’s like the sleepover you wanted, but better, because you have all these bittersweet feelings all stored up in you about everything that’s happened and for once you can live them instead of stew in them.  When he falls asleep in your bed, sometime around four in the morning, you get online and start looking for answers to figure out what’s going on with you, so that hopefully you can quit being a hot mess and start making peace with yourself.  And even though it’s hotter than your sweaty nutsack, you dare to let just a little of your skin rest against his. 


	8. Chapter 8

You caved and enlisted Rose’s help, after swearing her to secrecy and trying to downplay the insane number of conversations you’ve had in the past concerning Freudian slips and homoerotic imagery by talking way too long and pointedly about how gay you apparently are now.  But that’s just the thing.  Gay’s not quite right. Like, if you were to use a word to describe yourself, which is exactly something you’d like to have to help you begin sorting through the unreal amounts of self-reflection you need to do before you become a well-adjusted citizen again, the word wouldn’t be “gay.”  So you tried looking for a different word.  Something to summarize your experience of falling off the heterosexual bandwagon concerning your apparent attraction to Tavros.  You swept the entire internet, combed through hells of webpages like the knowledge you were looking for was some kind of information lice that needed found before all the other snot-nosed idiot children carry it home and infect their entire families, but you just got even more confused. Bisexual was your go-to term, because hey, you like women, but then you found pansexuality, and then demisexuality, and then some other handfuls of sexualities you didn’t even know existed before.  And then you got caught up in some gender theory, which you admittedly found to be pretty interesting and proceeded to discuss at length with anyone who would listen.

Long story short, figuring out exactly where your complicated ass landed on the Kinsey scale wasn’t turning out to be the easy quick fix to your journey of self-discovery you hoped it’d be.  Like, exactly how much do you like dudes?  Is your mad hankering for masculine affection case-specific?  You spent more hours than you care to count between classes watching people walk around and asking yourself, hell, is that a person you could be attracted to?  And after a while, people started to melt together and you’d start to think anything from a) you could literally be attracted to anyone on the planet if you tried hard enough, to b) nah, nobody’s really your type and you can’t really see yourself with anyone, to c) what the fuck even are human beings with their weird spindly limbs and stomachs and torsos and strange desire to suck on each other’s faces and exchange gross bodily fluids what the fuck?  Like when you stare at a word long enough and it starts to look wrong because everything is made up of the same twenty-seven letters and symbols ain’t shit.  So, since you clearly weren’t making any progress, you came clean to Rose and had some ass backwards feeling jams about it.  And she got you thinking maybe you were going about it the wrong way. Fuck, you don’t need a label, right? What you should be doing is focusing on your relationship with Tavros.  Tavros is your guy in question right now, and you don’t really need to be asking yourself how many dudes you’d pop a boner for unless for whatever reason any of them became a concern in the future.  Which ain’t likely to happen when you got Tavros up in your grill every goddamn day, filling up your living spaces and being generally a huge new part of your life.

 You’re pretty pissed with Bro for pulling the stunt he pulled.  Not really pissed in that you wish he hadn’t done it, because you definitely think this is the best solution to Tavros’s problems, but goddamn did he put you in a tight situation.  If he really thought he could shove the two of you into a packed room and expect you to emerge victoriously coupled like newly weds from their honeymoon suite, he sure doesn’t know a fucking thing about the courtship process. First of all, even you know better than to pull a move on someone who just broke up with a long-time girlfriend. Yeah, she sucked, but he wasn’t dating her because he was bored or some shit.  So that’s one month of casual disinterest down. Then, on top of that, you had to give him time to actually adjust to the unique isolated culture of your hazard zone of an apartment.  You were really stressing your shit out over that little pocket of uncertainty. Yeah, he’s been in your apartment before, but he had only glimpsed the full Strider life experience. You had no idea how he’d respond to the weird bullshit Bro pulls on a day-to-day basis, between the puppet shenanigans and the creepy mindgames.  The first time he found one of the unknown number of webcams Bro keeps set up around the apartment, you had to as coolly as possible explain to him about Bro’s websites and hobbies, all the while screeching internally because why the FUCK does he even have those things still set up if he’s really so fucking keen on playing zookeeper matchmaker with you?  And he’s still leaving his disturbing comics around the house for you to find.  You couldn’t seduce a desperate, sexually-deprived old maid in these conditions, let alone a reasonably attractive young man in his prime who used to decorate his own apartment with innocent fairy tale crap.

But Tavros found it all funny. At least, that’s what he said. And not funny like he managed to unlock the secrets of Bro’s dense as shit irony that you’ve been trying to understand for years now.  He doesn’t get any of the irony.  None of it. He just thinks it’s funny that you both do all these bizarre things that make no literal sense in actual context simply for the sake of some heavily coded and layered personal aesthetic. And you know what? From that perspective, maybe it’s a little funny.  Like, on the most sincere, literal level, Bro must look like some sort of quirky asshole big brother with nigh incomprehensible interests, to the extent that his incomprehensibility actually transcends logic and becomes funny in its own right.  Funny by virtue of being completely beyond understanding.  You’re glad Tavros has a pretty good capacity to find humor in things he doesn’t get.  That probably bodes well for you.

So you let Tavros get over his break up and get used to the apartment, but your biggest challenge, one that Bro clearly didn’t think through before throwing common sense to the wind, is how the hell are you supposed to find out whether Tavros would be willing to entertain the thought of returning your affections?  You’re not only a dude, you’re also a good friend, his roommate, and his key to saving up enough money to continue his education. You obviously can’t just sidle up to him on his floor mattress and say, “Hey dude, while we’re sharing this room anyway and you don’t have the financial stability to leave, how about you and me get down and dirty?”  Nope, that’s way out of the question.  Not even in the same reality as the question.  You have to play your cards carefully, like this is the final table in the world series of poker main event and you got the emotional equivalent of a hundred million dollars at stake.  Every card counts, every twitch of the lips, every fucking quirk of the eyebrows, it all matters.  And so you’ve been waiting, watching, feeling out the situation, searching for any hint of requital or at least flexibility in sexual orientation you could possibly dissect from Tavros’s demeanor.  And the problem with Tavros is that he’s so fucking dense that you can’t figure out if any of his accidental innuendos are Freudian in nature like yours tend to be or just completely oblivious and unfortunate linguistic mishaps.  Months have passed, you both enrolled in some basic core classes, you’ve brought out your cold weather clothes, and you still don’t know the answer. And now it’s winter break. He’s got work, and you got fuckall to do besides pester your chums online and maintain your blogs. But you do have one advantage—time to scheme, plot, and hang out.

And, with the help of Rose, you’ve finally got an idea.

Tavros is chilling at the desk next to your bed, and you’re cocooned in a nest of blankets you made for yourself after you woke up.  Your apartment is always cold in the winter.  It’s not like you get a hell of a lot of blowout blizzards in Texas, but your apartment’s inability to regulate its internal temperature doesn’t do you any favors when it gets chilly outside.  Luckily, Tavros has a space warmer he busted out in the last month. You’d be all about setting your computer up next to his and basking in the warmth of the heated coils, but you’ve got some mad anxiety rolling around in your gut that’s holding you back.  He’s got work soon, and the moments until he leaves are ticking away in your mind like you’ve got a literal grandfather clock tucked somewhere in the back of your brain. You’ve got something special in your pocket.  You’ve checked ten times already to make sure it’s there.  You check again now.  Yep, still there.  Fuck, it’s hard to pretend to be casually blogging when you’ve got big plans in the works.

“Hey, Dave?” Tavros says, and you almost jump.  You’re glad he’s not really looking at you, or he’d probably notice.  He’s gotten to know you a lot better these past few months.

“S’up?”

“Have you decided yet, what it is you intend to pick as a major?  Are you still thinking of paleontology?” he asks.  You sigh through your nose and try to ease into the conversation.

“I don’t know,” you say. “I was for a second before I saw how many rock classes I’d have to take.  Did you know paleontology is a geology thing?  Like, eventually you work up to all the cool dead shit, but it starts out with a lot of rocks.  I’m not totally discounting the idea or anything, but I gotta think a bit before I commit myself to several semesters of sifting through sand.”

“Maybe geology would be kind of cool, though,” Tavros says, turning to you.  “You might learn about all sorts of neat things, like, for instance, volcanoes, or maybe mountains.”

“Sounds boring,” you say. “I mean, lava would be cool for approximately as long as it would take to start sweating. I’ve done enough sweating. My sweating quota has been filled forever.”

Tavros laughs. “Okay, maybe that’s fair, and I also agree with that sentiment.  But, realistically, for an undergraduate degree, you probably won’t be visiting any actual volcanoes, so I think your criticisms of lava might be unfounded in this context.”

“You’re probably right,” you say with a small smile.

“So, but does that mean you’re not at all interested in working with, uh, dead shit anymore, or has that dream been shattered due to the necessity of studying rocks?”

“I dunno, man. I gotta do some hardcore soul searching on the topic.  By which I mean a half-assed internet search and maybe a meeting with my advisor, if he can get his head out of his ass long enough to be useful.”

“Yeah, mine is pretty much useless as well, when it comes to the topic of helping me determine the best path for my future,” he says, nodding.

“So still no verdict on the biology v. folklore case?”  You were secretly hoping he would pick folklore, just to spite Vriska. But you’re not about to muddy up his decision either way.

“Well...” he says, glancing at his computer.  He’s got some official-looking page open, and you recognize your community college’s symbol on one of the other tabs.  “I was thinking, maybe I could just take some folklore and mythology classes, for the purpose of pursuing my interests casually, but focus on the study of biology, namely zoology, or ethology, which, according to my search, I just found out to be the study of animal behavior.”

He looks at you expectantly, clearly waiting for your input, and you say, “Sure, bro.  That sounds like a pretty decent plan. I think you’d kick ass at animal behavior science, judging by your track record at the animal shelter.”

“Yes, I think so, too,” he says with a pleased smile.  “Not to be cocky or anything.”

“Be cocky. You’re good with animals. Fucking own that shit.”

“Okay,” he says, and his smile turns into a grin.  “In that case, I think maybe that’s what I’ll do.  I just wanted to ask your opinion on the matter first, in case it turned out to be not the best idea by your judgment.  And, uh, by the way, if you do decide to go into paleontology, like you were saying, I noticed that you’ll probably be taking biology classes—that is, along with those rock classes that you apparently also have to take, which I didn’t know about so much—but if that’s the case, we can maybe take classes together, to provide mutual support to each other throughout our studies.”

“Fuck yeah, sounds like a plan.  You can be the alive animal guy, and I’ll be the dead animal guy,” you say, and you add that to the list of pros in favor of paleontology.

“Yeah!  And, uh, maybe we can work it out so that, while you’re studying dead animals, meaning probably fossils, I can be around also studying other things of the more alive variety in the general area.” Now there’s a future plan you can get on board with.

“Definitely,” you say. “And in the meantime, you’ll want me around to work you through all the grisly dissections we’ll have to do.”

He pulls a face. “Oh, yeah, that’s...that’s a thing that I’m not looking forward to, in any way.”

“I got your back, bro,” you say. “If you need a guy to pick up the slack in the dead thing department, I’m your guy.  We’ll be the perfect pair.  Life and death, yin and yang of the animal kingdom. Complementary to the core.”

“Yessssss, like superheroes, except without any powers, and also without any exceptional responsibility to society, or basically anything else that makes superheroes heroic.” He flashes you a grin, his eyes bright and arched with laughter, and you just can’t even.

“Superheroes without all the extra responsibility and reluctant heroism?  I’m about that life,” you say, returning his smile. You found out over time how great his face looks when you really relax into a smile for him. It’s so obvious he loves it, like your smile is a treat he works to earn and really savors when he finally gets it, and your heart flutters in your chest.  Your fingers graze against your pocket.  Yep, still there.

“Oh, shoot, I have to get ready for work,” he says, and your heart does something way less graceful than a lovesick flutter.  Like, if fluttering is a thing birds do, your heart does the equivalent of a panicked, squawking thrash.  Your heart’s a bird drowning in a lake.  He gets up and strips off his hoodie to replace it with his work shirt, and you shimmy to the edge of your bed, trying to appear as nonchalant as you can. You usually see him off, since you don’t get up to stretch as much as you should now that Bro’s not harassing you into strifing him anymore.  As long as you’re smooth, Tavros won’t suspect a thing.

You follow him out of the room and lean casually against the futon while he tugs on his shoes. You hand him his coat. “See you later,” he says, reaching for the doorknob.

“Wait,” you say. He pauses.  Oh, fuck.  Oh man, here we go.  You try to take a deep breath without making it obvious that you’re taking a deep breath, and you pull your surprise out of your pocket.  You hold it out for him, and he outstretches his hand automatically to take it.

“...A thimble?” he asks, examining the small metal cylinder.

“Yep,” you say. You swiped it from Bro’s sewing drawer earlier when he and Tavros were both out.  Tavros looks up at you, brow drawn down in confusion. All according to plan.

“Why...?”

“Don’t worry, bro. It’ll come to you. You’d better get going if you don’t wanna be late for work.”

“Uh...okay, yeah,” he says. Still confused. Good.  Good good good.  You release a huge breath as soon as the door is closed and hurry back to your room.

 

TG: pan has flown with the loot

TT: Did he suspect the significance of the symbol?

TG: nah  
TG: but he will  


TT: Are you prepared for the outcome?

TG: uh  
TG: let me get back to you on that after it happens

TT: Fair enough

 

You curl up under your blankets and wait.  And wait. And wait.  And fucking wait jesus christ how long is this supposed to take?  Your internal grandfather clock sounds the hours as they pass.  You draw up a SBAHJ comic to distract yourself. It’s shittier than usual. Probably in a good way, but you can’t really decide.  You ask Egbert about it and then proceed to pester him for the better part of an hour. You down bottles of AJ. Mess around with your turntables. Take a forlorn selfie. Maybe he won’t get it. Maybe he’ll think you’re just a weirdo, being weird.  Just another Strider eccentricity.  Passin’ out thimbles.  It’s dangerous to go alone.  Here, take this. Protect your fingers. God, you’re a fucking idiot.

But finally, a familiar tone sounds. You dive onto your phone, but when you see Tavros’s name, you’re almost too nervous to open the message. But you do, because you’re not a pussy.  You can always play it off as a joke if something goes wrong.  Or a misconception.  Whatever, you got this.  You suck down air like you’re about to dive to the bottom of the sea and check out what he has to say.

 

AT: iS IT,  
AT: a KISS?  
AT: lIKE FROM pETER pAN?

 

Oh god, oh fuck, he figured it out, and you don’t have any idea how he feels about it over text message. This was a horrible idea. A fucking stupid idea for stupid assholes who don’t know how to deal with people goddamn it you should have stuck to online friends why did you even THINK you could pull this off fuck fuck FUCK

 

TG: yeah bro  
TG: just thought  
TG: you know  
TG: you could use like a symbolic kiss to get you through the day  
TG: or something  
TG: fuck okay scratch that  
TG: i mean  
TG: i thought it was kind of  
TG: like  
TG: i just wanted you to have it ok

 

You wonder how Dad Egbert would feel about you showing up on his doorstep unannounced. How long does it take to drive from Texas to Washington?  You’re going to have to steal a car.  Hey, at least you’ll be able to defend yourself in prison.  Thanks, Bro.  This is obviously the life you were meant for.

Your text tone sounds.

 

AT: oKAY, tHAT’S WHAT I THOUGHT,  
AT: tHANKS, aND,  
AT: i’LL BE HOME A LITTLE LATE, 

 

Wow, that message contained no relevant information at all.  “Thanks”?  Thanks. “Thanks for giving me the chaste symbol of a kiss from my most beloved childhood story.  You’re a pal, Dave.  A good pal.  Such a good friend.  Dang, the best of friends.  Such a friendly friend.  Also, I’ll be home late, so you’ll have just enough time to gather your essentials and cross the border into Mexico.”

You don’t gather your essentials.  You stay exactly where you are on your bed and shove in your earbuds to listen to some music. Clearly the only way to salvage your dignity is to blow the whole thing off.  It was a joke.  A silly miscommunication.  You could probably convince Tavros that it was really just a bro-to-bro way to express manly and completely not gay affections.  You just need to stand firm and defend your innocence. And then you’ll know where you and Tavros stand.  That’s a relief, at least.  You can begin the silent process of pounding your heart into the floor while staring at the stuffed animals Tavros shoved in with your dead shit collection. Yep, a big fucking relief.

You nearly jump out of your skin when you feel someone tap you on the shoulder.  You hadn’t realized how much time had passed. Tavros looks down at you with an interesting sort of smile on his face, one eyebrow lifted in an almost confused sort of way.  “Were you...sleeping?” he asks.  Incredulous, but amused.

“Yeah,” you lie, because if you’re gonna start this off chill, what better way than to be literally asleep? He plops down on the bed next to you and holds out his hand.

You glance from his hand to his face.  “What’s that?”

“Take it,” he says, his smile widening.

You offer him your palm. He sets his load gently on it. It’s...a thimble. But not the one you gave him. It’s much fancier, made of porcelain or some shit with little gold birds painted on the side.  You close your hand around it and work it into your fingers so you can look at it better.

“I, uh, actually got it from my friend, if that’s okay,” Tavros says.  “I went to see her as soon as I got off work, since I knew that she sews and likely had one that she was willing to part with, for non-sewing purposes.  She actually gave me this one, even though it’s the best one she has, after I told her the circumstances, so, uh...I’ll have to thank her better for that, probably.”

You don’t know if you’re breathing.  “So, this is...?”

“A kiss,” he says. He draws his legs up to hug them, but he’s beaming at you, softly, with this warm kind of affection you’ve never seen on anyone’s face before and definitely not directed at you. For once in your life, your mind’s blank on words.  You look down at the thimble, the pretty little thimble he brought home to you, and, like an afterthought, a sort of movement you might feel too much in a dream, you lift up your shades to look at it in natural light.  And you turn to look at him in natural light. God, those copper eyes are like the fucking sun, the way they’re dazzling you with all that affection.

It looks a little bit like you’d imagined love might look like.

“Can I give you a real kiss?” you ask, because he won’t ask.  He has that self-confidence thing.  But you’re hoping he’s sitting there wishing that’s what he could say, if he had the confidence.

“...Yeah,” he says, quietly for once.  You take your shades off, set them somewhere in the folds of your sheet, and lean towards him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [For those of you who wanted the kiss](http://mtjester.tumblr.com/post/125819645910/someone-mentioned-in-a-comment-on-paper-thin-walls)   
>  [Also, another additional thing from Tavros's perspective](http://mtjester.tumblr.com/post/124432917740/can-i-request-redpale-erikar-or-davetav-in-any)


End file.
